Blessings for God's People

Get out your green! St. Patrick's Day is almost here! As we salivate over thoughts of shepherd's pie and corned beef with cabbage (keep the drool off the keyboard) let's talk about a change in words: luck to blessings. The word "luck" is deeply embedded into our society. Sports players refuse to wash articles of clothing to keep up a "lucky streak", numbers and colors are defined as being "unlucky", we recall so many things in our day as being "luck" that keep us out of trouble or reward us in some way. My dictionary defines these two differing words as follows:

Luck: success or failure apparently brought by chance rather than through one's own actions. 


Blessing: God's favor and protection.

I don't know about you, but I would much rather have a blessing than have luck! Imagine, the creator of the universe looking on your little life offering you protection from the driver that doesn't appear to have a clue you are there, or favor in the form of being the winner of a drawing after a hard week. If we know and understand that our God is really in control over everything happening to this spec called Earth, is there really any luck or are we just blessed beyond our wildest dreams!

This week, instead of looking for luck to appear, look around you. How does God bless you each day even in very small ways? While you look for God's favor in your life, sink your teeth into this sweet treat to celebrate with the Irish!

Shamrock Sugar Cookies: how to decorate

You will need:

sugar cookies

royal icing

food coloring

piping bags

#2 tip for piping

#3 tip for decorative flooding

#4 tip for flooding or a plastic squeeze bottle

toothpicks

sanding sugar (optional)

Color and thin royal icing as desired and pore into decorating bags fitted with the appropriate tips as indicated above.

Outline cookies keeping piping tip at a 45 degree angle. Icing should flow easily from the bag. If it's too hard, squeeze icing back into bowl and add a teaspoon of water at a time to thin.

Once cookies are outlined, flood with thinned royal icing. Icing flows out quickly without squeezing the bag. I prefer to use a plastic sauce bottle for this rather than a piping bag. These are available at the 100 Yen store for those in Japan. Do not completely fill your cookie. Overfilling will cause frosting to run over the sides. Using a toothpick, push the frosting to the edges of the piped outline and filling in any gaps in the frosting.

While the frosting is still wet, you have the option of adding additional decor to your cookie.

To decorate with sanding sugar, set cookie on wax paper and sprinkle sugar on.
Let cookie dry for at least 2 hours before shaking off excess sugar.
(removing excess sugar may cause the wet frosting to slide off the cookie)

For a feathered effect, pipe in stripes using your #3 tip and a thin icing.

Using a toothpick, drag the icing down. Starting at the top of
the cookie, draw a line down through the stripes. 

Add pocka-dots by dropping dots of thinned icing into the frosting.
To make bigger dots, squeeze out more frosting.

These are just a few ideas to get you started. Have fun with your cookies and get creative!

Frosting needs 12-24 hours depending on humidity to completely dry. Do not stack cookies until they are dry. Store sealed in an airtight container or bag at room temperature for up to 3 days.