Steal This Idea: Blake Lively's Quirky-Cute Conversation Heart Cookies
Here's yet another reason to wish you were Blake Lively: the actress and lifestyle blogger has revamped the oft-saccharine conversation heart cookie by emblazoning them with cheeky phrases and song lyrics like "nope," "I've got a man," and "haters gonna hate."
While we love the idea, we can't help but interject with a few tips of our own as Blake's execution is, how can we say this politely, a bit rustic . . .
- First, start with this foolproof sugar cookie recipe; the salt in the batter is a nonnegotiable as it helps balance the supersweet icing.
- After stamping out the heart shapes, use a whisper-thin cookie spatula to transfer the cookies from countertop to baking sheet so as not to mangle their shape.
- Skip the Jello- and shortening-based icing (sorry, Blake, but no), and whip up a batch of classic royal icing tinted with gel food coloring instead. Not only is it made with far fewer scary ingredients (powdered sugar and egg whites), but it'll also keep its shape much better, so that the cookies come out pretty and legible.
- Follow these piping and flooding instructions for neatly icing each cookie. Keep one batch of the icing (tinted in your favorite color) thicker so that it can be used to pipe on your messages.
Afraid your piping skills aren't up to snuff? Try painting on the messages with food coloring and a paintbrush.