How to Make Skull Girl Cookies

Written by Mike Tamplin • Aug 26, 2016

It may seem that I'm on this morbid, skeleton kick lately. Which is understandable with the skull candle cookies in my last post and these skull couple cookies in this one. The truth is when it comes to decorating skull cookies, I like to consider them as somewhat of a blank canvas.

You can dress skull cookies elaborately and colorfully for Day-of-the-Dead themes. Or, you can go for simple elegance, as I did with these skull couple cookies. Today I want to focus on how to recreate the skull girl cookies and how to easily achieve the hair highlight effect.

Skull Girl Cookie Cutter

Recently added to the shop are these two cookie cutters: the Skull Girl Cookie Cutter and the Skull Top Hat Cookie Cutter.

Both cookie cutter designs come in 4 sizes: large, regular, small, and mini. For this tutorial, I'll be decorating skull girl cookies in the regular size.

Template for Decorating Skull Girl Cookies

The skull couple cookies pictured above is just one way of decorating them. I provided a template of both the skull girl and the skull with top hat cookie designs you see here as a guide, however these cookie cutter shapes can be decorated in any way you would like.

You can download the skull couple cookie template HERE.

If you have a Kopykake or Pico projector, just print it out (or pull it up on your mobile device) and you are good to go. For those without a projector, follow the suggested steps below by tracing the design onto the cookie with an edible food marker.

Decorating Process

You will need the following suggested colors:

Black piping and flood royal icing
(I used Americolor Super Black.)
White piping and flood icing (I used Americolor Bright White.)
Dark Blue flood icing (I mixed Americolor Royal Blue with Super Black.)
Red medium icing (I used Americolor Super Red.)

Step 1

With black flood icing and a food-only paintbrush, paint the inner area of the skull, as shown below. Let the icing dry.

Step 2

With white piping icing, outline eye holes, a nose, and around the skull’s head. Then, fill the inner area with white flood icing. Leave this to dry for 1 to 2 hours.

Step 3

Next comes the fun part. Outline the top bun area with black piping icing and fill with black flood icing. Then immediately pipe a band of dark blue flood icing across the middle of it.

Then, with a scribe tool or toothpick, randomly drag through the icing in various up and down strokes. Be sure to wipe the end of the tool on a paper towel after each stroke. Let the icing set for about 20 minutes.

Step 4

Next, use the same method for the top hair portion. Outline a hair line above the eyes with black piping icing and fill with black flood icing. Then immediately pipe a band of dark blue flood icing across the top of the "bangs".

Then, again with a scribe tool or toothpick, randomly drag through the icing in various up and down strokes. Be sure to wipe the end of the tool on a paper towel after each stroke. Let the icing set for about 20 minutes.

Step 5

Add the facial details next. For the lips, I added a heart shape with red icing. Then, with black piping icing, I added eyelashes and a mouth line, as show below.

Step 6

The final touch is to add two decorative roses on this skull girl's head. I went with using a fondant mold for the roses. However, you could also use royal icing transfer flowers as an easy alternative.

skull couple cookies by Semi Sweet Designs

Video Tutorial

The steps above are summarized in this time-lapsed video I put together. Seeing the marbling of the wet-on-wet hair highlight in action is probably better than how I described it in words above.