You’re Waffle Great!

Has anyone told you lately that you’re “waffle” great?

Also, I’ve missed your virtual faces (and fist bumps).

Because seriously guys, where does the time go? And how was my last post almost 2 months ago?! Rest assured, for those of you worried, I’m still kicking… And blogging. Just at a slower, more caffeine induced manner these days…

Why the absence? Suffice to say I went off and got myself a deeply rewarding, highly demanding job. Feelings of making a difference in the world: definitely! Channeling inner creativity on the daily: done and done! Full night’s rest: highly debatable. Ample opportunities for blogging: minimal… at best.

But lovely guys and gals out their in the blog-o-sphere, I think I’m finally hitting my stride and becoming slightly more functional. It’s too early to say whether I’ve finally become the master of my own time or have simply resigned myself to a sleep deprived, caffeine fueled existence. Slight eye twitch and a desire to go to bed at 7:30pm point to the latter…

But… Buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut, in my temporary departure from blog-land, I’ve continued baking and creating, which means I have a stock pile of posts to share. And yes, most of them are of the gloriously pun-y Valentine variety.

Admit it, you kind of love that about my blog (because seriously guys, seriously… so many puns).

Either way, I think you’re waffle great!

Waffle Sugar Cookies

Make someone feel “waffle” great with these waffle inspired Valentine cookies!

• Author: Claire of The Simple, Sweet Life
• Prep Time: 8 hours
• Cook Time: 9 minutes
• Total Time: 8 hours 9 minutes
• Yield: 24
• Category: Dessert
• Cuisine: American

Ingredients

• 1 batch sugar cookie dough
• 1 batch royal icing
• Brown and yellow food gel coloring
• Brown food marker
• Wilton #1 piping tip
• Small, food-only brush
• Baking cocoa

Instructions

1. Prepare a batch of sugar cookies. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to about 1/2″ thick and cut out circles. Using a sharp, lightly floured knife, cut some circles in half, some in fourths, and leave others whole. Bake on parchment paper lined baking sheets for 7-9 minutes, or until no longer shiny. Allow to cool completely before icing.
2. Prepare a batch of royal icing to a 20 second icing consistency (a spoonful of icing dropped back into the bowl should take approximately 20 seconds to reabsorb fully). If you plan on doing the text, ice some of your cookies with white icing, shaking gently to fill in any divots.
3. Put a couple of spoonfuls of icing to the side. Tint the rest of the icing a light brown. Flood the remaining cookies completely with the brown icing. Cover the remaining brown icing and set aside.
4. Once the icing on the cookies has hardened, attach a #1 Wilton tip to a piping bag and fill with the leftover brown icing. Pipe around the outside of each cookie, double lines through the center, and then work your way across creating the squares of your waffles. If you plan on creating the text cookies, now would be the time to pipe your text. I used this technique from Sweet Ambs to help create a stencil for the text. Allow the icing to harden completely.
5. Using a small, food-only brush, work a little bit of baking cocoa in and around the base of the waffle squares. With a brown marker, draw a line on two of the sides in each square. This will give your cookies depth.
6. Tint the leftover spoonful or two of the white icing yellow. Pour it into a piping bag with a #1 Wilton tip, and pipe a “splash” of butter on your cookies. Allow to set a couple of minutes before going back over and create a little square of butter on top of the “splash.”

Nutrition

• Serving Size: 1 cookie
• Calories: 223
• Sugar: 26.9g
• Sodium: 57mg
• Fat: 8g
• Saturated Fat: 4.9g
• Carbohydrates: 37.2g
• Fiber: .4g
• Protein: 1.7g
• Cholesterol: 27mg