Description
Soft and delicious black cocoa sugar cookies infused with peppermint extract and decorated with royal icing and crushed peppermint.
Ingredients
Scale
Peppermint black cocoa sugar cookies
- 3/4 cups vegan butter (or regular butter)
- 1/2 cup confectioners sugar & 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1/2 tsp peppermint extract
- 2 1/4 cups flour +
- 2 tbsp Dutch processed all natural black cocoa powder
- 2 tbsp cocoa powder
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
Peppermint Royal Icing:
- 2 tbsp meringue powder
- 1/4 cup warm water
- 2 cups confectioners sugar (sifted)
- 1/4 tsp peppermint extract
- Additional warm water a few drops at time
SUPPLIES:
- Tipless piping bags
- Edible gold dust
- Crushed peppermint
- Parchment paper
- Seasonal cookie cutters
Instructions
Peppermint Black Cocoa Sugar Cookies
- Preheat oven to 400.
- In a glass bowl, mix together flour, black cocoa powder baking soda and salt until combined. Set aside.
- Using a paddle attachment, cream together butter and sugars in the bowl of a stand mixer until combined.
- Pour eggs, vanilla extract and peppermint extract into the butter and sugar mixture.
- Mix on med until fully combined.
- Then pour the dry ingredients into egg, sugar and butter mixture.
- Mix together on medium until fully combined.
- You’ll know your cookie mix is ready when the bowl is clean and most of the dough sticks to the paddle.
- Lay a sheet of parchment paper onto a solid surface and lightly dust with flour.
- Roll dough out onto the parchment lined surface (about 1/2 inch thick)
- Cut into shapes with cutters of choice.
- Remove extra dough from cutout cookies and transfer the parchment paper with cutout cookies on it, to a baking sheet.
- Bake for 4-6 minutes.
- Cookies should be soft with a nice crumb texture.
- Cool on a cooling rack.
- Repeat steps for remaining cookie dough.
Peppermint Royal Icing:
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, whisk meringue powder and half of 1/4 cup warm water together on medium for 2-3 minutes, until thickened and well combined.
- Pour in the peppermint extract and confectioners sugar and switch to a paddle attachment.
- Mix on medium until well incorporated.
- The icing will be very thick. Add a few drops of the remaining warm water a few splashes at a time until the frosting is the consistency of toothpaste. This is for piping.
- Spoon out 1/3 of the toothpaste-like piping icing to a tipless piping bag and tie or seal closed.
- Add the rest of the warm water to the remaining royal icing and mix on medium until combined. The consistency of this icing should be runny.
- The thinned out icing is for flooding the cookies.
- If you run a spatula through the icing it should take around 5-6 seconds for any lines to disappear. That’s when you know it’s ready.
- If the flood icing is still too thick use a few drops of water at a time and mix in between to achieve the desired icing consistency.
- Note that a little bit of water goes a long way!
- Transfer flood icing to a piping bag immediately and seal closed so the icing doesn’t dry out.
Decorating the cookies:
- Place cookies on a piece of parchment or a clean working surface.
- Snip the very tip off the thick icing piping bag.
- Slowly outline the the edges of each cookie with the paste like peppermint piping icing.
- Then snip the tip off the flood icing bag.
- Squeeze the thin flood icing onto each cookie, starting from the edges inward. Use a toothpick or scribe to spread the icing evenly around the surface of the cookie, meeting the lines of thick paste like icing until the cookie is fully covered.
- Quickly poke away any air bubbles you find using a toothpick or scribe.
- Repeat steps so all cookies are fully covered in icing.
- Gently set each flooded cookie aside to fully dry. (Drying takes approximately 60 – 90 minutes.)
- Then details can be added with paste like icing.
- Once cookies have dried, add the decorative details.
- Starting at the top of each tree cookie, pipe the icing to the first tree point, then make a loop and continue piping with this same design, left to right, all the the way down to the bottom of the last tree point. Pipe a little of the outline icing at the top of the tree to attach the crushed peppermint.
- Finish with a dusting of edible glitter.
- Allow two hours to fully dry.
- Enjoy!
Notes
- Store in an airtight container for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 6 months.
Keywords: black cocoa sugar cookies, cutout cookies, Christmas cookies, peppermint sugar cookies, royal icing, how to decorate cookies with royal icing, royal icing recipe, black cocoa sugar cookies