Chinese New Year - Year of the Rat Cookies

These cookies are inspired...by a gift card at Starbucks. The Chinese New Year year gift card caught my eye at the register last week. It was covered with the cutest little rats. When is the last time you said something was covered with cute rats?

Well, they needed to be cookied.

I decided to use my black cocoa cut-out cookies as the base. I really wanted the red and gold to pop off of a dark color. (If you can't find black cocoa and don't have time to order some, just use only Dutch-process. They'll still be dark, just not quite as dark as these.)

For the cutter, I used the mini candy corn cutter from Sweet Sugarbelle. It's the perfect size for these babies - not too small, not too large. Just right.

You can really see the shiny gold here. It's so pretty and festive.

To decorate the Year of the Rat cookies, you'll need:

black cocoa cut-out cookies, candy corn shape
royal icing, divided and tinted with Americolor gel paste food colorings: Super Red, Americolor Gold, and Bright White (a tiny bit)
disposable piping bags
couplers and tips: #2, #3, and #1
squeeze bottle
toothpicks
gold luster dust (look for an FDA-approved one)
vodka or Everclear
food-only small paintbrush

Use a #2 tip to outline the rat body with red icing.

Thin the icing with water, a bit at a time, until it thinned. A ribbon of icing dropped back into the bowl should disappear in a 2-3 second count. Cover with a damp dishtowel and let sit for several minutes.

Uncover, stir gently to pop large air bubbles that have formed on top. Pour into a squeeze bottle.

Fill the outline with the thinned icing using a toothpick to pop air bubbles and guide to edges. Let the icing dry for at least 30 minutes.

Fit a bag of the gold icing with a #3 tip. Pipe a tail and ears. For the ears, start at the top with more pressure, let the pressure decrease as you pull back towards the body.