Pardon me for quoting from The A-Team (child of the 80’s), but “I love it when a plan comes together!”

My 11-year old son, Denver is full of helpful ideas. “You should buy this brand mom.  It is less per ounce.” he says at the grocery store.  Or he will suggest, “We should get sushi and snuggle”.  His clever ideas also include inspiration about cookies.  I was rolling out dough and he said, “What if we make cotton candy cookies using cotton candy sugar?” or “Can we put mini m&m’s into the chocolate cookie dough?”  I am always up for cookie experiments so I immediately comply with his every cookie wish.  FYI: the cotton candy sugar didn’t lend enough flavor but did result in a beautiful pink dough, and the m&m’s were mmmmmazing! 

So when he came up to me one day while I was decorating cookies and announced, “I have an idea for a cookie,” I listened.  “You should make one of a fortune teller with a crystal ball.  You could cut out a part of it and put in… what is that stuff called?  That clear stuff?”  Me, “Isomalt?  Here’s a piece of paper.  Draw what you have in mind.”

Denver quickly drew a rough sketch of what he was imagining and how I could create the illusion of the crystal ball.  He drew and explained and I sketched and clarified some details.  We walked into my office and picked out the right rectangle and a small circle cutter for the crystal ball.  I had a class to prepare for and cookies to decorate, but this was important… and I’m a procrastibaker.

The Plan

We got the cookie baked and microplaned and ready to decorate.  The background was originally going to be a galaxy design, but we soon discovered it competed with our turbaned soothsayer, who was the real star of the show and had to mute the colors by painting a layer of black food coloring over it.  Denver advised and complimented me through the process.  We made the big decisions together: hag or beauty? purples or blues? but I knew the part he was really looking forward to: the crystal ball!

With her tasseled throw and lacy tablecloth dry; her puffy sleeves and unruly hair painted, she was ready for her crystal ball!  Denver and I decided how much isomalt to melt and put it in the microwave, laughing like the mad scientists that we were.  “Mwah ha ha!”  I think we literally rubbed our hands with glee.  The microwave “dinged” and our laughter ramped up to maniacal.  We brought the clear lava carefully to our cookie and poured it into the circle cut out.  We filled it to the edge, creating a slight dome and we congratulated each other on how awesome we were.  We quickly added several tiny sparkly star sprinkles to the setting globe and had to give each other a stern talking to about not touching the isomalt until it was completely dry.  What self-respecting fortune teller had fingerprints on her crystal ball!?

She was everything we dreamed!  Little did we know it was about to get even dreamier.  The next morning Mr. John saw our creation and said, “That is so cool!” and he mysteriously disappeared.  He returned with a nifty gadget that looked like a watch.  He placed it behind the cookie and that’s when the magic happened.  Watch below to see it in action!

A collaboration with my favorite guys!  Who knew they were such cookie geniuses!?