rainbow unicorn sugar cookies with royal icing

To go along with the rainbow unicorn cake that I made for my daughter's 8th birthday, I also made these rainbow unicorn cookies as party favors, and also to pass out to her classmates on the actual day of her birthday.

For the cookies, I used my favorite sugar cookie dough (recipe in my book!), rolled it out to about 1/8 inch thick, and used these adorable unicorn cookie cutters from Cookie Cutter Kingdom to cut out my shapes. Then I baked them at 350F for 10-12 minutes, until golden brown.

While the cookies were cooling, I whipped up my royal icing (recipe also in my book!). Then I used a disposable pastry bag fitted with a small round tip to outline each cookie with stiff white icing, before filling them in with runny white icing. Then with the rest of icing, I used Americolor gel-based food coloring to tint them yellow for the horn, and rainbow colors for the mane and tail.

I had originally planned to do each unicorn with several rainbow colors, but after icing a few, I didn't like the way they looked. So instead, I chose one color for each unicorn, and did multiple colors that way.

I wrapped each cookie in cellophane favor bags and tied with closed with raffia, so that they would be easy for her to hand out to her classmates (and so they would fit nicely in her party goodie bags!)

Happy Birthday, Miss Melodie! Hope you enjoyed your unicorns!

rainbow unicorn cake with fondant unicorn horn

Last year for my daughter's birthday, she requested a unicorn cake. (She always requests unicorns!) So I had made her this one, with a buttercream rosette mane and a handmade fondant golden unicorn horn. 

Well, this year she asked for the same thing! But pink. And with a rainbow mane. So I obliged!

As usual, she wanted a vanilla cake with strawberries and whipped cream, so I baked up my favorite vanilla cake (recipe in my book!) in two 8-inch round cake pans, cooled them, and then sliced them in half horizontally to give me four cake layers. Then I filled each layer with freshly whipped cream, and fresh sliced strawberries.

Next I covered the whole thing with pink cream cheese buttercream frosting (recipe also in my book!) - first with a quick crumb coat, then 30 minutes in the fridge, and then a final coat of frosting, which I smoothed out with a long metal spatula. Then I let the cake chill in the fridge overnight.

The next morning, I was ready to decorate the cake. I used black frosting in a disposable pastry bag, fitted with a small round tip, to pipe the eyes on the front of the cake. 

Then I tinted my "rainbow" colors with Americolor gel-based food coloring, and used a large tip to pipe the buttercream rosette mane. I only had enough frosting left for three colors, so I divided the remaining frosting and chose blue and green to go with the pink cake.

The final touches were the handmade fondant unicorn horn (you can see how I made it in this post) and the white fondant ears. Although, in hindsight I should have made the ears pink. Doh!

The last color would be white, for a few "pops" of small rosettes.

At least the white rosettes kind of match the white ears?

Anyway, she loved the final cake. Even though blue and green don't actually equal rainbow. But whatever, close enough!

For her birthday party, we just invited a few of her closest friends for a small party, and we had movies and pizza and video games. And cookie decorating. And unicorn cake, of course!

Happy 8th Birthday, Miss Melodie!!!

unicorn cookies

To go along with the unicorn cake in my last post, I also made unicorn cookies as favors for Melodie's 7th birthday! I had received this awesome unicorn cookie cutter from Cookie Cutter Kingdom a while back, and now was the perfect time to use it! (Thanks Cookie Cutter Kingdom!)

As always I made my favorite sugar cookie dough (recipe in my book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book!), rolled it out to 1/8 inch thick, cut out my shapes, and baked them at 350F until golden brown (about 10-12 minutes).

To decorate, I whipped up a batch of royal icing (recipe also in my book!) and used stiff white icing to pipe at outline around each cookie (using a disposable pastry bag fitted with a small round tip).

Then I filled them in with runny white icing and let them dry for several hours.

For the horn I used medium (in between runny and stiff) golden yellow icing, and a mix of Wilton violet and Americolor violet to color the medium icing for the mane and tail (the violet by Americolor was a little more on the blue side, so I had to mix in violet by Wilton to make it more purply).

I thought they were pretty cute, but needed something to jazz them up! So I used a little bit of royal icing to "glue" on a few edible gold stars onto each unicorn.

They added just the right amount of sparkle!



Hope you enjoyed your cookies, Miss Melodie! Happy birthday!

unicorn birthday cake with handmade fondant unicorn horn

My daughter Melodie LOVES unicorns. She is always drawing unicorns, has unicorn stuffed animals and toys, has unicorns on her backpack, and always says she wishes she could ride one. So for her 7th birthday this past December, I knew I had to make her a unicorn cake! (And this time it wouldn't just be piped on like last year's Toki Doki winter unicorn cake, or the pink Toki Doki funfetti unicorn cake the year before!)

I've been seeing this unicorn cake design all over Instagram and Pinterest lately (although I first saw it on Sweet & Saucy's instagram feed), and it's so cute I knew she would love it. So a few weeks before her birthday, I started making the fondant unicorn horn. I used white fondant, which I tinted with gold gel-based food coloring, and then I formed a long cone shape and used a toothpick to add the "unicorn horn" spiral details.

Then I let it dry on a curved plastic surface to keep the cone shape in place.

The night before her birthday, I started on the cake. I baked up two 8-inch vanilla cakes (recipe in my book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book!) and sliced them in half horizontally, giving me four cake layers. Then I filled each layer with freshly whipped cream and sliced pitted cherries.

Then I frosted the top and sides of the cake with cream cheese buttercream (recipe also in my book!), doing a quick crumb coat first, the chilling it for 30 minutes, and then doing a final coat smoothed out with an offset spatula. Then I let it chill overnight.

In the morning, I was ready to decorate!

Using black frosting in a disposable pastry bag and a small round tip, I piped smiling eyes, complete with long lashes.

Then I used gold luster dust mixed with clear vanilla extract to paint over the unicorn horn, giving it a shimmery look. (I forgot to mention that I also made unicorn ears!)

I placed the unicorn horn in the middle of the cake, and then piped a swirling rosette unicorn mane using a disposable pastry bag fitted with a large star tip (I filled one side of the pastry bag with pink frosting, and the other side with purple frosting, in order to get the half pink / half purple effect).

Then I added the unicorn ears, which had toothpicks inserted into them so that the ears would stay in place on the cake.

So cute! I loved the way it turned out!

I mean, what little girl wouldn't love a happy smiley unicorn cake?!

Happy birthday my Melodie! We love you!