Welcome to How To Cook That I am Ann Reardon
Today we are making camera pinata cookies and I'll show you some secret tips and myths
about getting the perfectly shaped yummy tasting sugar cookies as well.
All the recipe quantities that you'll need are on the website howtocookthat.net and I'll
put a link to that page in the description just below this video.
Measure out your all-purpose flour or plain flour, sugar, butter or margarine - I like
to use margarine but you can use butter.
Then for spices I am using cinnamon and nutmeg, one egg and some vanilla extract.
Now tip your sugar, margarine and vanilla into a bowl and mix it on low speed until
it is just combined, on my mixer this takes only 1 minute.
Now this is an important tip - if you use high speed here or you mix it for longer you
are going to incorporate heaps of air into your cookies
Then when you put them in the oven the air will cause the biscuits to rise and spread
out.
Let me just show you so you can see that.
Compare these ones and they have been whipped with the butter and sugar and when you bake
them in the oven and compare them to ones that were only just mixed.
They taste fine, but you can see they have spread out and if it is a round cookie who
cares if doesn't really make a difference but if you are trying to make an intricately
shaped cookie then this is just going to get rid of all the details in your shaping.
Back to our mixture,
Add you egg and again just mix it in don't whip it, and you know why now.
Then add the flour and the spices, I haven't put these through a sieve again because that
introduces more air and we don't want air in our mixture Mix on low speed until it forms
a ball, If you don't have a stand mixer you can do this stage of mixing just by hand.
Place half of you mixture onto some non-stick baking paper and flatten it down then add
two objects that are the same height you could use chopsticks, I am using new paint stirring
sticks.
And they're just going guide the rolling pin so your cookies are even thickness the whole
way through.
Place another sheet of baking paper over the top and push it flat with a rolling pin.
You can't really roll it because it is quite soft dough you are more just pushing it and
flattening it out.
And see how our rolling pin is resting on the levels here so that on each side it's
resting on it and you get that perfect even thickness to your dough.
Slide that onto something flat and place it in the fridge overnight or in the freezer
for about 10 minutes, do the same with the other half of your dough as well.
Now you may have heard it said that if you chill your dough it will not spread out as
much in the oven, this make no logical sense, but let's test the theory anyway.
This row has been sitting at room temperature room temperature, this one has been in the
fridge overnight and this one has been in the freezer for 15 minutes.
Lets bakes those in the oven.
And once they are done, let's have a look if they have spread.
The room temperature ones compared to the fridge ones, they are exactly the same size.
Now room temp compared to the freezer and again exactly the same.
So that is a myth that is now busted, chilling them makes no difference to them spreading
in the oven it is the amount that you whip them that is important.
Chilling them is good just to let that margarine or butter firm up which makes the dough firmer
and easier to cut out.
Back to our camera cookies.
You can buy a camera cutter or if you get yourself a roll of aluminium flashing or aluminum
flashing if you are in the US, you can make your own cutter.
Just cut a thin strip and shape it around a camera icon, I'll put this size icon that
I am using on the website so you can print it out as a guide as well.
When you come to the rounded corners just wrap the metal around something round like
the handle of an ice-cream scoop or whatever is round that you've got in your kitchen.
When you are making a straight corner just bend it on something straight like the back
of a knife to get that sharp edge there.
Once you get back the beginning trim off the excess and tape it into place to that you
get a smooth join there when you are cutting out your cookie shapes.
Take your dough out of the fridge and cut out your camera shapes.
Place them onto a baking tray and bake them for 10 minutes, and turn the tray after 5
minutes so that you get even browning.
And make sure you set a timer so you don't burn these cookies.
They really don't take long at all.
Now for the camera lenses take two round cutters, cut a tray of the larger sized circle.
And then half of the circles cut out a hole out of the centre.
Now if you want some of your lenses bigger you can cut more than half of them with a
hole out of the centre but you'll need at least one full one for each camera.
Using a smaller circle push it into the centre and then lift it up and as you lift it tilt
it slightly to one side and use the edge of the cutter to lift out the middle section
of the biscuit dough.
For each camera cookie you want to have one or two of these rings and one whole circle.
And these are smaller than the other ones so they are only going to take about 6-8 minutes
in the oven instead of 10.
Roll out any left over dough and cut more cookies.
To make our icing we need icing or confectioners sugar and powdered egg white and whisk them
together with water.
Where I live powdered egg white can be a bit pricey so I use a packet of the pavalova magic
mix, which is just egg white and sugar I'll put the quantities for both options on the
recipe on the website so you can use whatever you can get hold of.
I like to put most of the water in at once and then add the remainder one tablespoon
at a time until you are happy with the consistency.
You can swap some of the water for lemon juice or vanilla so that you can add a flavour to
your icing.
Beat it on high for a few minutes until it looks like this.
It should be thick and glossy and hold its shape.
Place some of your icing into 5 bowls, leaving some white in the main bowl.
Then add some liquid or gel colouring to each bowl to make them different colours.
I am going for more retro sort of colours you can make them brighter if you want.
Make three different camera colours, one grey and then leave some white as I said and then
we need to make black.
To make black add some cocoa powder and mix it in and then add some black gel food colouring.
Now the cocoa powder is going to dry it out a bit and make it a bit too thick so just
add a little bit more water to bring it back to piping consistency
Take each of those and place them into a plastic bag and seal it shut.
Then cut off a tiny corner off the outside and pipe a rectangle sort of shape not quite
a rectangle really for the camera flash on each of the biscuits on the top there.
If you muck it up don't worry just wipe it off and try again.
Then take your round cookies and pipe a white circle in the centre of each one leaving about
a half a centimeter border from the edge.
Now for the colours, draw a line across the cookie about 2/3 of the way up and then follow
the outline down and around the outside.
Repeat that with the next colour placing the line at roughly the same height it doesn't
matter exactly where it is but if you put it next to one of the cookies you have already
done you can get them all about the same.
Now for the top half of your cookie use some grey to pipe along the line and around the
top.
Now I have had lots of requests lately for a chocolate truffles part 3 video so I want
to know what flavours of truffles you'd like me to make for you.
So make sure you watch first the videos part one and part two so you know what we've already
done like caramel and all of those ones and I'll link to them below.
And then put your chocolate request for new chocolate truffle flavours in the comments
section.
And I'll give you a few weeks to get all your requests and then I'll tally them up and make
the most requested ones for you.
Then pipe a grey circle to outline each of the lenses following the outside of your cookies.
Leave those for 5 minutes to firm up and then we are going to flood fill them which is a
bit like colouring them in.
Take some of your white, grey and coloured icing and place them in a seperate bowls.
Then add a little bit of water to each one and mix it in.
You want it to be thick but when it's drizzled from the spoon it should after a moment merge
back into the icing that's in the bowl leaving a smooth surface.
Using a spoon place some in the centre of each camera lense.
Then use a toothpick to spread it out to the edges.
For the flash bit it's going to be easier if you put it into a plastic bag and pipe
some of that thinned icing in.
Then use your toothpick to spread it out.
Repeat that same thing with the colours and the grey so that you are filling it up and
spreading it out to the edges.
Then we want to leave them for a for a little while for the icing to dry on top.
Now take your black icing and outline the camera lense.
Now if you have a piping bag and a piping tip number 1 then use that for outlining as
you'll get a more even line.
If you don't then you can just use your ziplock bags with the corner cut off like I showed
you before.
Also pipe a couple of lines across the lense.
Now outline the camera going around the flash then around the grey section and then all
the way around the coloured part.
Then I'm leaving these overnight for the icing to set firm.
And then we will come back to it tomorow
Now that they are all set firm, take one of the rings and pipe some firm icing around
the edge in a circle and put that into place.
Now you can have just use one ring or if you want a bigger lense you can use two.
SO just put icing around it and put it on top.
Fill that up with candy I am using nerds in some and mini m&m's in others.
Then pipe a circle of icing on the back of the lense and then add it to the top of your
camera.
And as I said you can use one or you can use two rings to make a bigger or smaller lense.
With the bigger ones I'm going to pipe stripes of grey up the sides here to give that bevelled
edge look around your lense.
When you make these make sure you take a photo of course and upload it in the comments section
on the website for the world to see.
I love seeing what you guys have baked.
Subscribe to How To Cook That for more crazy sweet creations.
Have a great week and I'll see you on Friday.
[music: The Boat Song by youtube.com/setsailtv used with permission]