My last post showed how to re-purpose a cookie cutter for a design the cutter wasn’t intended for. I know many people have been doing this for years, but reusing a cutter is always a challenge for me. I usually end up hand-cutting the dough for an idea I come up with. I struggle with thinking outside of the box cutter.

However, after finishing those Frosty cookies, I felt inspired and thought maybe I should continue this challenge of cutter creativity. After eyeing over my cookie cutter collection (it’s a tiny collection), I came up with a creative way to use and reuse a snowman shape, AND it involved no extra trimming or altering the shapes.

I cut out a few snowmen shapes using this cutter. This just happened to be the particular one I had on hand, but any snowman shape with a hat would work.

I decorated one as a typical snowman with a top hat. I turned one shape upside-down and decorated it as a Santa’s elf on a stool, and I left a 3rd piece blank for the base.

For designing the elf piece, I first traced the snowman cutter shape on paper. Then, I sketched an elf on the inside of that shape, trying to use most of the inside area, with a red prismacolor pencil. (This pencil is great for sketching because the lead is soft and it erases easily and cleanly when you need rework an area.) After I’m happy with the sketch, I go over it with a extra-fine point Sharpie pen. This was my guide for icing.

After I finished icing the elf and snowman cookies, I let them set overnight before starting the construction. I attached the snowman to the base cookie using really stiff royal icing.

Using what I had lying around (in this case I used a cookie cooling rack, a bowl, and a cook book) I gently pinned the snowmen in place while the base icing hardened. You can see from the photo I made more than one snowman scene. I always make extra just in case disaster strikes during construction and a cookie breaks. Nothing did break on me this time, but better safe than sorry.

Once the snowman was securely attached to the base (dry time was around two hours), I attached the elf piece using more stiff royal icing. I piped a tiny bead of icing where the two pieces touched for added stability. I let this dry with the back of the elf cookie resting against a cooling rack for support.

Lastly, after the elf and snowman were on the base securely, I outlined and flooded the base area with white icing.

Now, looking back over the finished cookie, I think it would have been better if I flooded the base with gray icing. That way it would look like the snowman’s shadow on the ground. I’ll remember that for next time.