One Ring{master cutter} to Rule Them All

Using “cookie cutter” as an adjective usually means something is boring and predictable. (ie: I don’t want a “cookie cutter” wedding dress!) But the beauty of a cookie cutter is: the number of ways to use one shape is in the eye of the beholder. Cookie cutters aren’t borders that stop creativity, they can actually inspire brand new ideas and methods of decorating; not to mention it can save you money to re-purpose shapes you already have. Let’s take for example this cookie I designed above to coincide with my CookieCon 2019 keynote speech I gave this past March in Reno, Nevada. I created a Circus Ringmaster as the theme for my speech was “This is the Greatest Show“.

My friend Ann Clark of “Ann Clark Cookie Cutters” was so generous and offered to make my sketched shape into honest to goodness, real cookie cutters to give away to all the CookieCon attendees! Well, I figured now that so many of you have one, let’s use that puppy! and if you don’t have one, you can grab one here.

Think outside the box, but inside the cutter

One of my favorite things to do when I get a new cutter is hold it up and ask my kids what they see. As they are listing off shapes I slowly rotate the cutter to see if they discover something different. It’s the cookier’s version of the “lets see what shapes we can find in the clouds” game and dang, my kids are good at it. Between my 3 kids, my husband, my evil sidekick Kim, and our exchange student, we came up with a list of 27 cookie designs using this one cutter… TWENTY-SEVEN! That’s a useful cutter and I bet you could come up with even more, because you’re smart like that.

I may end up trimming the hat brim off a couple of designs, but other than that, they will hail from the exact same shape you see above. Of course it’s one thing to write a list of possibilities and it’s another to actually cookie them. So today I’m starting a series called “A year of cookies: One cutter” where I will bring our list of 27 cookie ideas to life. This is where the icing hits the cookie!

The first magical transformation: Ta da!

Isn’t he adorable?! This particular idea came from Kim and I think he fits so nicely! Since I have 27 designs to create, I thought I would introduce a couple of my ideas in cookie form each month for the next 12 months.

Also, I promised to share my list of ideas, so without further ado and in no particular order, here is my list of:

27 ideas for “Arty McGoo’s Top Hat Cookie Cutter”:

Now the bunny is out of the hat! There are no guarantees the actual cookie’d results will be phenomenal, but I can’t wait to put these ideas to cookie!