Midwest Mary

I love a good cookie and enjoy baking but I am not very patient when it comes to decorating. My solution this holiday season was to decorate with edible wafer paper made from potato starch, vegetable oil, and USDA approved food colorings. I wanted to see how easy applying the paper would be to dress up an otherwise plain cookie.

I purchased the papers from Fancy Flours, Inc (www.fancyflours.com, 406-587-0118). Their site offers a number of products for baking and decorating as well as excellent recipes for gingerbread and sugar cookies. I chose three of their many different designs. The square and rectangular shaped ones are the easiest to cut out and also the easiest to cut cookie dough to size.

Use of the wafer paper requires several steps. The directions are as follows: Make the cookie dough ahead and allow it to stiffen in the refrigerator. Roll out the dough and cut to accommodate the shapes of the paper.

When completely cool, frost the cookies with buttercream, royal icing, or fondant. I used fondant on a few of the gingerbread cookies, but I’m not a fan of it. Although it is very smooth, I think it is too thick, too sweet, and not very tasty. The remainder of the cookies I frosted with a mix of confectioners’ sugar and whipping cream. The simple recipe allowed the frosting to remain white and covered the cookies without too much thickness. Once frosted, I froze the cookies until the frosting was completely set.

After carefully cutting the wafer paper designs, the directions said to brush a light coat of corn syrup on the back of the papers. I found it easier to dab the corn syrup on the cookie, slide the paper over it, brush the edges, and press down gently.

Turn the cookies face down on parchment paper for about 30 minutes to set.

Turn them over and allow to  completely dry.

Embellish the cookies with piping and sprinkles as desired. The paper is somewhat fragile and requires careful handling but easy enough that I will try them again. My cookies look a bit sloppy, but with a little more patience, next time they could be quite beautiful.

©2013, Mary K. Doyle