Flat Dots

One of the easiest ways to add interest to your cookies is with dots. They can make even the simplest design look fancy and are super simple to do. Here’s what you will need:

• Sugar cookies
• Two colors of royal icing
• Offset spatula, butter knife, toothpick, or spoon

To start, follow the instructions in The Basics on how to outline your cookies using one color of icing (we will call this color 1). In this example it is orange.

Allow the outline to dry, then fill in the cookie with icing color 1. Use your spatula, knife, or spoon to spread the fill icing to cover the entire cookie.

Before the fill icing has a chance to form a crust or film, use icing color 2 (here, brown) to add your dots. The color 2 icing should sink down into the color 1 icing, but not spread. If icing color 2 spreads, wait a minute or two and try again. If the dots don’t sink down, you can gently encourage them by taping the top of each dot with a toothpick or gently wiggling the cookie back and forth a few times to encourage the icing to settle.

If you are happy with your dots, stop here. It’s that simple.

If you want to try something a little extra, you can make some fun designs with your dots. Create stars by starting in the middle of the dots and dragging outward toward the edges with a toothpick to create points. To create small hearts, start at one edge of the dot and drag a straight line through the middle. You can create a chain of hearts by making a line of dots and then dragging through the dots with your toothpick with one continuous motion. Experiment with different techniques to see what other designs you can get.

If you want dots that sit on top of icing color 1, wait until the fill icing is dry or mostly dry, then add your dots. You can do both flat and 3D dots on the same cookie to get a unique effect as well. The sky is the limit!

Here are some examples of cookies where I have used this technique:

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