Need to make some delicious sugar cookies without dairy and don't want to waste ingredients with a non-dairy butter that won't work? You're in luck! I tried out all the leading non-dairy butters I could find and ranked them by flavor, texture, and spread. Keep reading for the best non-dairy butter for roll out decorated cookies! Whether by preference or due to an allergy, if you've ever found yourself in need of substituting your tried and true ingredients and brands with an unknown ingredient, it can be frustrating to go through all the effort and expense of making, rolling, cutting, and baking sugar cookies only to discover that they've spread horribly or taste like... well... like nothing YOU want to eat. Much less share with others.  I get asked A LOT about butter substitutes. I've tried a few different kinds of non-dairy butters with mixed results. I was trying to figure out some kind of sciencey-type formula based on the ratio of fat to water to.... I ...

A royal icing mix that claims to make shiny gold icing that you can PIPE straight out of the bag and not need to paint to get that ultra-shiny gold look? Is it the real deal or too good to be true? (Spoiler alert - IT'S LEGIT!!! The Evil Cake Genius Gold Icing Mix is a total cookie decorating game changer.) Oh you guys. Tell me if you've heard this story before.  Your client wants gold details on their cookies. The perfectest, shiniest, precisest gold details that every existed. So you make those gorgeous cookies. You ever-so-carefully and masterfully pipe those details with an icing that is as close to gold colored as you can get. And then you  mix your shiny gold luster dust of choice to **just** the right consistency (hopefully!!) and then painstakingly paint every. single. tiny. detail. for hours on end with an absolutely tiny brush...hoping to only get that gold luster dust exactly where you want it. Only to end up with cookies that feel like they were finished by Jackson...

Learn more about the Dripcolor Double Ended Food Pens to help you decide if it’s a PURCHASE or a PASS!   I am not a stranger to food color markers. You guys. This is a safe zone, right? I own probably over 100 food color markers. Ten or twelve different brands. Dozens of colors and shades. Thin ones, fat ones, dried out ones that really should just be thrown away. I've even MADE MY OWN food color markers. So when Jennifer of Bees Baked Art Supplies wanted to send me some of these Double Ended Food Pens from Dripcolor - I was ALL IN!!

I know this isn't my usual type of Fantastic Find...but if you know me at all...you know I've got about a million kids around here. And by " a million, " I of course mean " four ." Or more. Some days my kitchen is just full of kids. And I absolutely love when they are interested in cookies or baking...or making anything kind of food at all for themselves. So a baking book for kids seemed like it would fit right in at my house.

Oh... I bet you guys thought I forgot about Fantastic Finds! I totally didn't. I have an entire basket full of fun finds that still need to be tested to determine whether they are fantastic or not. But after trying the PenBlade this week to hand cut some cookies....gah! I couldn't wait any longer to share it with you!

Who doesn't love shiny cookies? I mean, really truly SHINY cookies? Okay, not every cookie needs to reflect my own face..but when you want that just-washed-actual-glass look instead of the very-nearly-almost-looks-like-glass-if-you-kind-of-squint-and-turn-your-head-sideways look, what is a decorator to do? Allow me to introduce you to the PME Clear Edible Glaze Spray. It works just like it sounds. You spray it on your cookie and it makes it shiny. The end. I bet you were hoping for a little more detail than that though, huh? Don't worry. I'll just keep talking until one of my children start crying. I kind of thought that I would just spray a little bit on my cookie and walk away and it would be crazy shiny. The first thing I noticed though, was that there were little bubbles all over the surface of the cookie right after I sprayed it. I kind of freaked out and for some reason, my instinct was to keep on spraying until the bubbles disappeared, but the back of t...

 Royal icing ingredients are kind of a big deal in my life. As in... I do NOT kid around about them. And I do not trade up my favorites. With the craziness surrounding meringue powder this last year though, and the skyrocketing prices of egg white powder... I've been testing a bunch of different choices so I would have a good back up in the event that my world ends and I can't find my favorite egg white powder. So when Fat Daddio's emailed and said they had a new meringue powder this summer, I jumped on the chance to try it out. I'll be honest. By that point, I had tried a few different meringue powders and they were all very much alike. I expected Fat Daddio's to fall into the same line as the rest of the meringue powders I had tried and would have been pleased if it had. But to say I was surprised at the taste is an understatement. Without ANY flavoring at all -- this meringue powder tastes BEYOND AMAZING. It's like angel food cake batter but with butt...

I've tried a lot of tools in my years of cookie decorating. I always seem to come back to the simple products. I use the same 8 bottles of food coloring for almost every set of cookies I make. In fact, I would guess that I use 10% of my decorating supplies 90% of the time. It's pretty rare when a new product makes the 10% list right away. But I'm telling you... not only did these icing scrapers make that list...I ordered 30 more within a month of purchasing the first set.  But, I'm getting ahead of myself. It's an icing scraper. You've seen them before in many forms. This one is a small, thin piece of plastic that is used to scrape icing across a stencil like a spatula. It has a little circular grip at one end to keep it from slipping out of your hand. It's simple. And basic. AND I LOVE IT. Let me tell you why -- 1. It's quite small. The scraper is about 1 1/5 inches across. Because of that, it's really easy to grab icing out of a bowl...an...

Oh my goodness. You totally thought I had forgotten about Fantastic Finds, didn't you? I might have...if it wasn't for my overflowing basket of finds that are desperately begging to be shared with you! First up in the very long line of finds - are these GORGEOUS hand crafted pewter measuring spoons from Crosby and Taylor . You guys. I'm kind of obsessed with these. Basically they are gorgeous pieces of pewter that you can also use to measure with. It's not that complicated.   Each and every measuring spoon, measuring cup or other beautiful piece of pewter from Crosby and Tayor is hand crafted. No two items are identical. As a bit of a (sugar) artist myself... I LOVE THAT. And they are so smooth and so shiny and I love that too. But don't worry about the whole, "mistakes happen" aspect of handcrafted -- each one is tested to make sure it really measures as it should. And not only are they perfectly accurate... ...but there is just SOMETHI...

I like painting on cookies. I love luster dust and I mix my own custom airbrush colors. And I have a cookie cabinet full of tiny plates and dishes with all my custom food color splotches all over them. I just can't bare to wash them when I put little pieces of my soul into each color. But my custom airbrush colors just go dumped down the drain. Every time. And if I accidentally forgot to decorate just ONE more cookie...(What?! Who ever forgets one more cookie on a different tray than where it belongs?!) ... I would have to attempt to re-mix my colors again exactly. But it always turned out to be exactly-ISH. And I would hide the poor cookie on the bottom of the platter even though it never did anything wrong. Poor little cookie. I just couldn't handle being that kind of monster. So when I saw these Micro Jars , I knew in my heart that they were meant for me. It's basically a hard plastic case with 30 TINY jars inside. The jars are about 1 inch by 1 inch. Which is be...

I love when "fun" meets up with "easy." And these ruffle tips are that perfect pairing. When I first got them, I couldn't think of a reason to use them....and after I tried them out....I couldn't stop wishing I had more reasons to use them! The basic idea behind ruffle tips is that they are shaped all totally weird so that the icing is pushed in such a way that ruffles are automatically created as you squeeze the icing out of the piping bag. You know, because moving your hand up and down to make ruffles is SO last year. I couldn't find a chart that shows what all of the ruffle tips look like, so I was really excited to try them out with some left over icing. The top line of ruffles is what each tip looks like if you just squeeze and move your had from left to right. The bottom line of ruffles is what each tip looks like when you move the piping tip up and down like you normally would to make ruffles. As you can see...there's not a lot...

I LOVE the recent resurgence of cake and cookie decorating!! Remember when wedding cakes basically required the existence of columns and a cascade of flowers?! And now you can get a cake that *actually is* a replica of the Taj Mahal!! I love it!  I feel like cookie decorating has only just begun it's ascent into fame and acceptance. Cake decorating has had more time being "popular" and even still...it's taken a while for fun new tools to come out. The good news is that when cake and cookie decorating have an overlap...we reap the benefit!! For example, I've been seeing fondant in the baking aisle of grocery stores for a few months now!! It's usually located below the sprinkles. I have avoided the Wilton fondant (it has great properties for beginners....but tastes awful!) and was super excited to see Fondarific Fondant being sold in the baking aisle at Walmart. So naturally, I grabbed 3 or 7 of them to try out. There were 5 different color choice...

I know this week's Fantastic Find isn't as cookie-centric as most of the other finds, and I almost didn't post it. But the truth is... I love the PERFECT FILL dispenser so much I couldn't help myself. And it kind of has a cookie use... It's basically an all-in-one coupler and tip designed just for dispensing batter. Like cupcake batter or pancake batter (or putting FLOOD ICING into a bottle!!!!) It's kind of hard to see in the picture but the purple tip of the dispenser is a piece of thick-ish silicone cut in a star pattern. (It might not be silicone. I actually have no idea what it is made out of. It could be rubber. I am not an expert on man-made materials. Do not judge me. It's purple. I know that for sure.) You put it together like you would any other coupler/tip set. Put the base into a piping bag and screw the dispenser cap on snugly. I used a giant piping bag I purchased in South Korea, but THIS GIANT piping bag would be perfect. Or... if...

I'm pretty obsessed loyal to my Ateco couplers. I even wrote an entire blog post about why you should buy them and how to tell them apart from other couplers that are only pretending to be them. So I knew going in to this that it would take a pretty stellar coupler to rock me from my solid Ateco Coupler Love. The Twist Quick Coupler promises easy tip changes and a cap to keep your icing fresh between decorating sessions. Both sounded fantastic to me. I'm going to be honest... for one coupler that costs between 3-5 dollars, I was expecting a lot. It is made of super sturdy plastic -- which I love! The regular Wilton couplers are a really thin plastic and warp easily. I can't imagine this one would ever have that problem. Also the different parts connect to each other really well. Which is also fantastic, because again, the regular Wilton couplers have messy cross-threading issues. So this is definitely a step up. The weird part is that this coupler is actual...

I love that in this crazy-technology driven world some of the most primitive relaxation activities are coming back into vogue. And by that I mean....I no longer have to be embarrassed to admit that although I am a fully functioning adult, I still like coloring and puzzles. And candy. And sleeping. And this "Edible Garden" Springbok Puzzle made from cookies created by The Cookie Architect is the best of all my worlds put together. It's cookies without calories. It's colors and textures and patterns. I love picking out which pieces were made with the same color of icing and trying to guess which layer came first. I can justify spending hours staring at all the details that make Rebecca's cookies incredible. And I can do it with my kids. (Or without my kids. If I'm having one of *those* days. You know those days. They usually end with either tears or ice cream. Sometimes both.) Also...this puzzle is only 500 pieces. Which is kind of my favorite puz...

I feel like I live my cookie life on an elusive hunt for texture. When everyone else is chatting away about getting the smoothest, shiniest surface possible...I'm over here poking holes in mine with a scriber. I've seen this icing comb and other similar variations used on cakes for years. But when I saw the ATECO ICING COMB again a few weeks ago...I realized I just wasn't seeing it's true potential. So...you know... I bought one or seven of them. And I tried it out with some cookies in my nautical baby set. And now I have a lot to say about it. (Surprise!) (Not really.) Are you ready? The comb is designed to be used with gobs of frosting. As in...you put gobs of frosting on a cake and take part of it off with the comb...creating texture literally in it's wake. I'm not really into gobs of royal icing on a cookie, so I used it more like I do when scraping icing across a stencil. I used a knife to put a thick consistency icing on the edge of the comb ...

I'm going to be honest with you -- I had pretty low expectations for this "Easiest Rose Ever" Cutter . Like, I already had a mental list of friends I could pass it on to after trying it out. I've pretty much never had success trying to make a sugar flower that looks like an *actual* flower. I've tried a lot and I just don't have that special thing inside of me that makes it happen. (I think it's called "patience.") This cutter is designed to be used with fondant or gum paste. Basically you roll one of those things out real thin, cut a piece of it with the cutter, fold that piece of fondant or gum paste in half and then just roll it up into a magical sugar rose. Like this. But it can't really be that simple, right? I mean... I'm SURE I can find a way to mess it up. And I did. But only a little bit. Let me show you.  The package with the cutter came while I was photographing the wedding cookies this week. I ripped it open ...

I think it's clear that I have a bit of an obsession with gold and brushes right now. And when I saw these CLICK-TWIST BRUSHES ...they seemed to be the perfect mix of the two. So naturally I ordered 5 of them. These brushes are SUCH a great concept. They are like pre-loaded water brushes . But unlike water brushes...they actually work with metallic and pearl colors. I was worried that the metallics would have been watered down to make them work, but they are actually a pretty good, thick coverage. To make the color come down into the brush, you have to twist the end. When you first get the brush, you'll have to twist it a few times before the coloring comes out. Keep an eye on the tip of the brush. It doesn't come out in a thin stream -- it's more like each twist releases a little glob of color. Don't be impatient like me and twist it a bunch or you'll end up with a ton of coloring coming out all at once. The biggest downside to these brushes is that t...

I'm actually not sure what brand came up with these TRI-COLOR COUPLERS to begin with. I've seen them all over being sold under different labels. I've wanted to try them since last spring when I made the camouflage cookies with....3 bags inside another bag. You put the coupler inside a bag like any other coupler. Then you take 3 bags of icing and slide each one through a slot in the coupler. Pull them firmly out through the tip and close the exterior bag with an elastic or clip to keep pressure on the interior bags. At this point, if you have a medium size tip (Normal cookie decorating tips like #1 or #3 are all small size tips. a 2D or a 1M are medium size tips.) I don't have a medium size tip that is round...so I just didn't use a tip. When you are ready to use the icing, cut the end off each of the interior bags and go for it. It took me about 7 seconds to make this brightly colored camouflage egg cookie. Although... I can't for the life of...