DIY cookie cutter

Sorry for the iphone at night photography but I was too chuffed not to share straight away... no time for natural light and styled up photos (I did enough of that at work this week)

These are custom made tulip cookies.. yep the girls and I finally figured out how to make our very own cookie cutters at home.. All of the tutorials I found online suggest cutting the strip of metal and then you have to glue the shape closed.. and I thought surely there is a better way.

First we tried a drink can.. but it snapped every time I bent the tin? far too thin. So then Tali suggested a Milo tin but we didn't have one so we used (but washed thoroughly in hot soapy water) a large tuna tin. I think you could experiment with all sorts of tins for different sized cookie cutters.

The great thing about using a tin is you don't have to glue it closed as it is already a whole shape!

Step 1 Open your can of food using a can opener that leaves the rounded edge at the top of the tin intact, this is the side of your cutter that you press your hand onto.

Step 2 Using tin snips cut into the base of the tin so that you can angle the tin snips to start cutting the base off. This cutting all the way round to create an even edge is a little tricky and dangerous... be very careful not to cut yourself as you cut your way around the tin... slowly slowly wins the race!

Step 3 Using a pair of plyers bend your round cookie cutter into any shape you want... don't attempt it with just your bare fingers as you may cut yourself, use the plyers like a bending tool to create angles. My girls chose a flower so it wasn't too hard to do free hand. You could draw a picture onto paper and use it like a template to guide where you need to bend the tin.

Step 4 Make your cookie dough, we still love Marthas Ginger bread recipe from a million years ago, we make sure we add lots of spice, wholemeal flour and half the sugar.

step 5 While your cookies are in the oven you will have about 10 minutes to make the fondant style icing. I found this recipe on Pinterest and think it is as close as you will get to pure genius.

Melt a bag of marshmallows in the microwave for 20 seconds (obviously with out the bag) and fold in icing sugar until it forms a rollable dough. You can add normal food coloring too!

Step 6 Roll the marshmallow dough out and cut out (using your brilliantly clever bespoke cookie cutter) shapes to stick onto the cookies while they are cooling on a rack. YUM!!

I would like to say I can photograph these cookies again in the morning sun to show off how pretty they are but we ate them all...

I will just have to make some more... Lily has asked if we could please make an Oscar (Schnauzer) cookie cutter next... ahem? I will take a pic of the tulip cookie cutter though so you can see how easy it is to make.

Comments

[matt]

What a great idea you have here. I would of never thought that you could turn a can into a cookie cutter. Now instead of throwing them away you can put good use to them. Way to save time using premade cookie dough. Thanks for the idea.

[silke]

such a cool idea! thank you very much :-)

[Theresa]

This is GOLD....absolutely fabulous! Well done and thanks for sharing Carly.

[suzy]

I love the tuna-tin-tulips - fantastic idea! And the marshmallow icing sounds so much easier than other fondants I've tried. Thanks for sharing.