The product we used:
Children love cookies
December 1st is National Cookie Cutter Day. We at Globalkitchen Japan would like to remind you that we sell a variety of cookie cutters made by our friends from TIGERCROWN. I know, it hasn't been that long since you made delicious, fragrant Halloween cookie memories with your children (whom you love, I assume) using the instructions we provided. But we bought way too many of these cookie cutters, and we know your children (whose love can be bought easily with cookies) love making cookies with cookie cutters, so we feel like we can easily pressure you into buying the Cake Land Stainless Steel Cookie Cutter 3D House (set of 7) the same way TIGERCROWN's sales representatives pressured us.
Here's how we're going to get you to buy those cookie cutters: English instructions on how to make the cookies and icing for your cookie house.
The set comes with instructions in Japanese, but we feel like we can wage a pressure-sales campaign on a wider audience in English. Be sure to read our tips for building the perfect house below. Remember, your children (who, in the future, will have the power to send you away to an old-person home of inferior quality if you aren't careful) deserve the perfect Christmas.
Cookie Recipe
Ingredients
- unsalted butter, 55g (about 4 tablespoons)
- sugar, 110g (about half a cup)
- egg, 1
- vanilla essence, a little
- cake flour, 225g (2 and 1/4 cup)
- baking powder, 1 teaspoon
1. Warm butter, sift dry ingredients
Bring the butter to room temperature. Sift the flour and baking powder together and set aside. Sift the sugar and set aside.
2. Whip butter, sugar, and egg
In a large bowl, whip the butter. Slowly add sugar and continue beating. Once the mixture is light and fluffy, add the egg and vanilla essence and mix.
3. Mix in flour
Slowly add sifted flour in with the mixture and mix until the flour is incorporated into the mixture. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for 30 minutes to rest.
4. Flatten, cut, and bake
Preheat the oven to around 170-180 degrees celsius (around 350F).
Take the dough out of the refrigerator and roll it out about 3 or 4mm thick. Cut with the TIGERCROWN Cake Land cookie cutters. Place the cut cookies onto a baking sheet and bake for 10 to 15 minutes.
5. Build house
Once the cookies are done baking and cooling, build your house. Use the icing to hold the cookies together and to draw windows, doors, etc. anywhere you like. The set comes with instructions that show how you can build the house. The text is in Japanese, but if you can build something from Ikea, you can handle a little cookie house without reading anything.
Icing Recipe
Ingredients
- egg white, 1
- powdered sugar, 50g
1. Beat egg white, add sugar
Beat the egg white until the consistency is a bit watery. Add half the powdered sugar and continue beating until it starts to stiffen. Add the rest of the powdered sugar and beat until it's well integrated and the icing is stiff.
Tips for beginners
If you are baking and building a cookie house for the first time, consider making extra house parts. The cookies may not stay completely flat or uniform in shape the first time, so having a collection of house parts to choose from will make it a bit easier to build the cookie house of your dreams. This is doubly true if you are baking and building a house with your children.
The cookies in this recipe tend to be quite hard. Our 3 year old daughter (who has all of her teeth) had trouble biting into the cookies. That's good for building the house, but not so good for eating it later. Consider baking for a shorter time if you would like softer cookies and are willing to take a risk that they'll break during the build step.
Depending on the size of your eggs, you may have more egg white and thus softer icing. Add more powdered sugar if you feel like the icing you have is too soft and you want more confidence in its ability to hold the house together.
Buying your childrens' love has never been so easy
We've been tip-toeing around the issue, but now I think it's time to make our message clear:
Buy the Cake Land Stainless Steel Cookie Cutter 3D House (set of 7) from TIGERCROWN, immediately.
Use our English instructions to make the cookies--together with your children (whom God demands you love)--and then cut them with the cookie cutters.
Bake the cookies and then glue them together in the shape of a house--together with your beautiful, smart, talented children.
If you follow these simple steps, we can guarantee that your children (which, need we remind you, are constructed partially from your DNA) will love you. And honestly, given how easy and clear our instructions are, it would be a crime against God and nature for you to ignore them.
What's that? You already ordered the cookie cutters?
See, pressure-sales works. It's just that easy, folks.
