Yoshi’s Cookie Cookies

In the spirit of the changes that are happening or have happened with IGGPPC, I’ve decided to help out with the cooking and baking activities on the site. Fandom recipes are something I love to tackle and have worked on in the past. I’m going to be using each month’s theme as a guideline for the recipe(s) I work on each month. I’m also hoping to set up at least one bake-along each month so members can bake and chat together.

This month’s theme is Retro Gaming and we’ve been having a fun time discussing games we grew up playing at IGGPPC HQ. The recipe options are virtually endless with this theme so I ended up making something that I’ve thought about doing in the past – Yoshi’s Cookie Cookies.

I chose to make a cake mix cookie over classic sugar cookies because I’ve been very busy lately and taking an entire afternoon to make sugar cookies didn’t appeal to me and I thought I’d ease into the fandom recipes with an easier cookie option.

Now on to the recipe!

Cookies:

3/4 cup butter, softened

2 egg yolks

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 package French Vanilla Cake Mix

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

2. Combine butter, egg yolks, and vanilla extract in a large bowl. Blend in cake mix gradually. At this point, my rings were removed and I worked the cake mix in with my hands until the dough wasn’t sticky.

3. Roll dough to 1/8 inch thickness on lightly floured surface. Cut with cookie cutters. Place on ungreased baking sheet.

My cookie cutters!

4. For the cookies in the donut shape, sprinkle a mix of sugar and cinnamon on the cookie before baking. Bake for 6-8 minutes or until edges are light golden brown.

5. Cool 1 minute on baking sheet and then remove cookies to cooling rack. Once cookies are cooled, it’s time to decorate.

Decorating:

Piping gel

Icing colours – purple, green, red, and yellow

Add the appropriate icing colour to a tablespoon or so of piping gel. Mix well and then either with a spoon or piping bag, make circles, squares, or hearts on your cookies. I found blending the gel with a spoon worked well. I made the brown colour with the leftover purple I had and some yellow and red gel added in.

I played around with a lot of ideas for the centres of the cookies. I felt that coloured icing wouldn’t be shiny or vibrant enough. I considered using jam or jelly but the idea of buying and opening three different jars didn’t sound like the best idea to me. Plus the centre wouldn’t really set and I wouldn’t be able to stack them up nice in a tupperware container. This is when I though of the container of piping gel in my cupboard. I could manipulate the colour easily, it was inexpensive in case I messed up anywhere, and it would provide the shiny texture I wanted.

I really love how they turned out and how they look set up like a Yoshi’s Cookie level.

If you make any Retro Gaming-themed goodies this month, please share them in the Cooking thread on the forum or tag me on Twitter or Instagram!

xo Sparkles