I made the sweetest baby deer cookies to give to my nieces the other day and I’m so happy with how they turned out. I say that because each time I pipe cookies, I get nervous right before drawing on them with royal icing. I’m much better with a pencil. These turned out totally cute though. Yay and Happy Holidays!
Here’s a link to the fawn cookie cutter I used. I just love the sweet shape and I’ve been admiring it on pinterest and instagram for a while… so I finally ordered one.
Also… Here’s the sugar cookie and royal icing recipe I used.
You’ll need royal icing in brown, green, pink and white. I just guesstimated how much of each. Brown and white with the most, a little green and a tiny amount of pink.
Now for decorating… You can totally pipe the deer in one color, or give them more detail. I went for more detail, but I didn’t want to take any chances on screwing them up, so I used a black edible ink writing pen to draw on the cookies first. This is much easier than winging it for me.
When you’re ready to pipe, just trace over the outlines with icing. Brown first.
While the outline was still drying, I carefully piped a little pink ear and used a toothpick to coerce the royal icing gently in the shape I wanted.
Next up, I filled in the white tail, tummy and face areas. I didn’t use outline icing here, I just piped and filled at the same time with royal icing that’s slightly more fluid than the outline piping consistency.
Now the fun part. With the brown outlined, go ahead and fill in the body with flood consistence brown royal icing. And while the icing is still wet, pipe teeny-tiny dots with flood consistency white royal icing.
I like to use a decorator bag fitted with a no.2 tip for outlining and usually a small squeeze bottle when filling in with color.
Okay, now let dry. Let dry. dry.
Then you can draw on hooves with a brown (or black) edible ink writing pen.
To finish the faces, attach tiny noses with royal icing as glue. I used rainbow chip sprinkles. The brown ones make the perfect little nose.
See… super cute. I went easy on the eyes and drew them closed with long eyelashes using the black edible ink writing pen again. Sooo handy and the closed eyes make them seem even sweeter.
The trees are easy peasy. Cover the surface of the cookie in green royal icing and let dry completely. Then pipe on wavy lines of white icing and sprinkle with white sanding sugar before the icing dries.
You don’t have to decorate tiny trees, but they’re going to make the next step tree-mendously adorable.
See what I mean?
Okay, back up to cutting deer and tree shapes out of the dough and throw in a few round circles that are a little wider in width than the deer’s legs. Use the fawn cutter to make marks in the dough that match the leg spacing and then grab a straw. Press the straw down in the cookie dough a few times to remove dough where the legs will go.
After the circles bake, you can reuse the straw to immediately remove any cookie that may have spread. The openings in the circle make it easier for the deer to stand while you attach it to the base.
Not shown: Pipe and fill circles with white royal icing and sprinkle with sanding sugar. Then when the circles and decorated deer are completely dry, fill the holes with a small amount of melted white candy coating (it dries more quickly than the royal icing). Place a decorated deer into the candy coating and hold in place while the coating sets. Then attach a tiny tree with more melted candy coating. Sprinkle sanding sugar on any of the exposed coating so it appears seamless with the rest of the cookie base.
Enjoy!
Cookies are great but it will take too long to make.
LOve these. Just thinking too, I admire how well you explain the process. You are an artist, a baker and an engineer- all in one. Great combination and why you became so popular! Oh, forgot to mention-you are an inspirer too! Keep it up! Love all your projects.
So cute! Did you use a chestnut brown food coloring or just like a chocolate brown?
love the blog
DARLING! Can I ask where you got the brown sprinkles for the nose?? Thank you so much!
Adorable and lovely
Hi such a cool blog, definitely following
These are precious, and your attention to detail puts them over the top!
So gorgeous, thanks for sharing! Did you make one with a red nose?
Susan a talented artist. These deer cookies are works of art.
These are just so adorable. My granddaughter just loves Bambi. I’m going to ‘try’ and make these with her. Thank you!
Squeeeee!????????????
It would honestly be such a shame to eat them – they’re so pretty… and you make it look so easy!! xx
Well I know I’m “fawning” over here! Simply beautiful. These remind me of a retro Christmas card. Merry Christmas Angie to you and your Mom! :)
Your artistic skills with icing improve every time you make cookies! These are gorgeous!
Thanks for the tip about using edible markers to draw the lines down first. I don’t have great control with icing yet, so that will be a great help to me.
Great job!! Very impressive. Merry Christmas, deEr Angie!
You have the patience of a saint! These are adorable. I’d be curious to know how many of these you made; one would be the limit of my ability! LOL!
Beautiful Fawn Cookies! Kids really love to have them on any occasion. Not perfectly like yours, but will try to make these cookies as per your instructions and will add them to my site.
Thanks for sharing
I can’t believe these are cookies. You must have special powers. They are beautiful
This Looks awesome! But due to my shaky hands i would make Bambies with some kind of brain damage! :D
These might be the cutest cookies I have ever seen in my life!
My goodness. You just keep outdoing yourself! I adore these!
These cookies are just amazing! Thanks so much for sharing them, they are just perfect. Merry Christmas!
Just so sweet! I loved them all along through the post, and then to see the 3D/standing version that really put them over the top! Love them! Have a wonderful Christmas Angie!
Who could possible eat these works of art? I would want to preserve them. Delightful.
Those eyelashes. The incredible detail on these cookies is absolutely outstanding. Thank you for showing us all how to decorate these beauties. Sammie.
Wow! These are amazing! Love the vignette you made with them!
I’m fawning over your talent! Wow — how creative and precise. Love these.
Magnifique !! I LOVE THEM
These are flawless! What an amazing job you did! Love the closed eyes and those eyelashes. Beautiful!
These are the cutest cookies I’ve ever seen! And your icing skills are SO IMPRESSIVE. Love these!
These cookies are the cutest!!!! How can anyone stand to eat them?! lol.
These cookies are amazingly cute and truly gorgeous! I’ve never decorated sugar cookies in such detail before, but your clear-cut instructions are inspiring me to try! Thanks!
These are just amazing. My daughter just adores Bambi. I will share this with my wife, she will be trilled to make them. Thank you!
I can’t even. That is the cutest thing I have seen all year. I and I have a baby.
Beautiful cookies! Could you share the recipe you use for the different consistencies of royal icing and your sugar cookie recipe?
The cookies were delicious, but I had to close my eyes to eat them because they’re so pretty.
OMG, so adorable!
These are so adorable!. It’s Bambi in cookie format xD
Oh my goodness, these are so amazing! I think we need to change your name to “Queen Bakerella”! You are so talented and the Queen of baking! Thank you for sharing with us!
Wow.These.Are.Amazing.
So inspirational! I’m not much of a baker, but I love looking at other bakers creations and these are just incredible and they look yummy!
Almost too cute to eat…. :D
Totally sweet!
Angie these are beautiful and perfect. I love that you used edible markers to outline – that’s genius! I like that idea so you don’t have to think each time what needs to be done. This makes it more like a coloring book. Great idea! Although I didn’t think you could use the marker on top of the hardened icing. Just last week when I went into a kitchen supply store they told me it wouldn’t work so I opted to not purchase the markers. Obviously they were wrong. Is there a trick to using the markers over the royal icing?
I love everything about these and how you created them to look like works of art. I can’t wait to try this.