Cookie Baking and Decorating
A few simple steps and you can create beautiful cookies you will be
proud to give as delightful gifts or to serve to your friends and family!
Wash in soapy water, dry and season your cookie stamps before using them each time by brushing them with cooking oil. A toothbrush is ideal for this. Do not use butter to season the stamps as it will turn rancid over time. When you are finished using the stamps, wash again in hot soapy water, dry thoroughly, and store.
Be sure not to overcream the butter and sugar as this may introduce excess air into the batter which can cause the imprinted design to “melt away” in the oven.
Roll a 1″ ball of dough in granulated sugar and dip the stamp in sugar for better release from the dough. Dust off any bits of dough from the stamp before using it again. Another option is to use flour in place of the sugar to keep the dough from sticking to the stamp.
Use an ungreased cookie sheet so that the dough will adhere to the pan when you lift the stamp up.
Experiment with cookie recipes. Avoid recipes with leavening (baking powder or baking soda) as designs tend to “melt away” the more the cookie rises.
Flours vary and affect the dough’s ability to hold the stamp designs. Those with more gluten my hold the designs better. Experiment with adding more or less flour than the recipe calls for.
• Make sure your dough has enough flour to prevent the cookies from spreading too much in the oven. Dough should not be sticky and you should be able to handle it without flouring your hands, but it shouldn’t be so dry that it’s crumbly. It should have a consistency similar to play dough.
Use “homogenized” peanut butter rather than natural types that separate in the jar (the oil rises to the top and it has to be stirred).
Baking time & temperature:
…thin cookies bake quicker than thick cookies.
…if outside is too brown but inside is not done, lower the temperature and increase baking time.
Bake until set but not browning, though a little brown on the edges is fine. Allow to cool on the pan for just a few minutes, then gently remove to a cooling rack. If you leave them to cool completely, they will stick to the pan.
To store stamps, clean with hot soapy water to remove all traces of butter (which turns rancid), then rinse and dry well before storing. Use our 28-stamp display to show off your collection.
Tint lightly-beaten egg white with food coloring, or mix food coloring with powdered sugar and water. Apply with a paint brush after cookies are cool.
Goosehill Farms’ secret recipe combined cornstarch and powdered sugar with powdered egg whites and food coloring to decorate the shortbread cookies shown in this Christmas gift box.
These shortbread cookies were painted with Luster Dust®. Apply with a paint brush. Design shown is #412 Rosebud.
Springerle cookies are so beautiful just as they come out of the oven that you don’t need to paint them with food coloring.
Problems with the designs “melting away” in the oven?
Baking is so tricky, there is no one answer to some problems, and the designs melting away in the oven is one of them.
In the last several decades, there have been numerous changes to flours and butters so that they do not behave as we expect them to.
Flours vary and affect the dough’s ability to hold the stamp designs. Those with more gluten may hold the designs better. Experiment with adding more or less flour than the recipe calls for. Also, flours can vary from batch to batch, according to the source and types of grains used in the flours.
Butters contain some water, which can affect the results of your baking. See this explanation on Wikipedia. Experiment with different butters or margarines to see which ones work the best.
Here are some suggestions from our more experienced cookie-stamp bakers to help the designs remain distinct during baking:
• Try using bread flour, which has more gluten than all-purpose flour, to hold the design better.
• Add gluten to your all-purpose flour (you can find gluten on Amazon.com).
• Some bakers add cornstarch and/or powdered sugar to the flour.
• Reduce the leavening agent (baking soda or baking powder) in your cookie dough, or leave it out all together.
• Some have success by putting the cookie sheet with stamped cookies into the refrigerator (or freezer) before baking the cookies. Others chill the dough before stamping, then chill again after stamping and before baking.
• As noted above, don’t over-cream the butter and sugar as this may introduce excess air into the batter which can cause the imprinted design to “melt away” in the oven.
• Experiment with different recipes. Our customers’ all-time favorite recipe is Eleanor Rycraft’s Almond Butter Cookie, which you can find on our Recipes page.
Click here for dozens of cookie stamp recipes!