Sugar, Sugar

This morning, I woke up with a completed cookie jar on the table. It had been painted, yes, but its destiny had not yet been completely fulfilled... it was time to fill the sucker with cookies.

But not just any cookies.

Since this cookie jar is going to be a gift for my good friends (and newly-engaged-couple) Noam Greenberg and Sarah Zeidel - may they not see this blog before tomorrow night lest the surprise be ruined - I had to make cookies that would be tailored to their needs.

The dough
I decided to go with a classic Flyshack family recipe - the Queen's famed Hamantaschen dough. This stuff is good all year round, no matter what the occasion. It would serve nicely for my sugar cookies.

The shape
Hearts, of course. These people are getting married, man.

The design
This was a bit complicated. I wanted to incorporate their initials (“N” and “S” would suffice), and I also wanted to do it in blue and white – besides the obvious Tzioni motif, they also happen to be the colors of Yale, Noam and Sarah’s stomping ground.

The icing
After consulting my local baking expert (Mrs. Rebecca Wertheimer), we decided that the appropriate icing for the job was “royal icing”. This icing dried hard, so that the cookies could be stacked without smearing away the design. For coloring, I used a concentrated jar of blue icing coloring (yes, they actually make this stuff).

And so, music trying to blast out of my laptop’s mediocre speakers, I whirled around the kitchen, making cookies. Two hours later, I stood back to survey my work, and snap a few photos.

The result