Heart Cookies for Valentines Day

🧾Ingredients

For the Cookies:

• All purpose flour - sift before using.
• Granulated sugar (caster sugar) - fine sugar works best for these cookies. Coarse sugar will leave speck of sugar marks on the surface of the cookies after baking.
• Butter - use salted butter. Salt enhances the taste of the cookies. If using unsalted butter, add one eighth teaspoon of salt when creaming the butter and sugar.
• Egg - binds all the ingredients for the cookies into a soft dough. Use large egg.
• Vanilla extract - for the flavoring.

For the Decoration:

•  Chocolate – Used to coat the cookies. You can use any chocolate you want, and I used dark chocolate.
• Fondant – I only used one color which is Satin Ice fondant in red. You can make also make your own fondant with this homemade fondant recipe or this marshmallow fondant recipe and tint the fondant red. However, this will take quite a lot of coloring to achieve the bright red color.
• Fondant glue - to make the bow.

Tools and Other Supplies:

• Heart shape cookie cutter - to cut the cookies.
• Pizza cutting wheel– Use this to cut the fondant when making the bow on the cookies.
• Fondant shaping tools
• Toothpicks – these were used to help in making the miniature puffed fondant hearts on the cookies as well as to apply chocolate to the hearts to stick them to the cookies.
• FMM Sugarcraft Pattern Press for polka dots– This tool is to help mark the dots on the chocolate covered cookies for the placement of the miniature puffed hearts.
• Wire racks– These are to place the cookies after dipping them in chocolate.
• Parchment squares - to place the cookies after covering with chocolate.
• Sugarcraft knife - to cut the fondant.

*Refer to the recipe card below for full list of ingredients and exact quantities. For best results, use a digital kitchen scale where applicable*

👩‍🍳How to Make

Step 1: Mix the cookie dough

Prepare the baking trays and clear some space in your fridge as you need to chill your cookies in the baking trays before baking. Pre heat oven to 175 degrees Celsius.

Place butter in a large bowl. Add the granulated sugar (image 1) and cream both on medium-high speed until the mixture turns light and creamy with an electric mixer (hand mixer or stand mixer). If using a stand mixer, use the paddle attachment. Do not over mix.

Next, add the egg (image 2) and continue beating on medium speed until it is well incorporated into the creamed mixture. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl. Add vanilla extract and mix again.

Finally, add the flour in batches into the creamed wet ingredients and mix these flour mixture until the dough comes together (image 3). Place the dough in a cling wrap (plastic wrap) covered bowl and refrigerate until it is firm. This step helps give the dough enough time to rest and is easier to handle.

Step 2: Shape and bake the cookies

Remove dough from the fridge and divide it into smaller sections for easy rolling.

To ensure the heart sugar cookies were all in even thickness, roll dough the on lightly floured surface in between 2 dowel sticks. In doing this, you place your rolling pin on both the dowel rods as you roll the dough (image 4).

Note: That way, you will get a uniform thickness for all the cookies.

Cut the rolled sugar cookie dough using the heart-shaped cookie cutter. Place cutouts on a parchment paper or baking sheet lined baking tray.

Refrigerate the unbaked heart shaped cookies for about 30 minutes before placing them in the oven for baking.

Bake cookies for a bake time of 10 to 15 minutes (baking time will depend on your cookie size) until the sides start turning golden brown. Remove the cookies from the oven and let them rest for 2 minutes before removing them to a wire rack (cooling rack) to cool (image 5).

Once the heart sugar cookies have cooled down to room temperature, you can start to decorate them. If not using immediately, store cookies in an airtight container.

Step 3: Coat the Cookies in Chocolate

For this, melt the chocolate over a double boiler (see my post here on how to melt chocolate) or in a microwave. To make your own double boiler, place water in a small pot (image 6).

Place the chocolate in a heat proof bowl (medium bowl) and place it on the pot, making sure the water is not touching the bowl. Turn on the heat and let the chocolate melt. Turn off the heat and let the bowl remain on the pot. This will help ensure the chocolate does not set as you are dipping the cookies in (image 7).

And then dip the cookies, one by one into the chocolate. Lift them with a fork and place them on a wire rack to let excess drip off (image 8). After that, transfer them to a parchment paper to let the chocolate set completely. 

Once transferred onto the parchment squares, place them in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes to let the chocolate set. Remove them from the refrigerator and trim off the excess chocolate that has settled at the edges of the cookies. To do this, while holding the cookie on one hand, carefully remove the parchment paper underneath in sections and trim off the excess chocolate (image 9). 

Note: Another option for covering the cookies with chocolate is to arrange them on a wire rack and pour the melted chocolate over the top of the cookies. With this option, only the top and sides of the cookies will be coated with chocolate. The bottom will remain uncoated. I chose the first option because I wanted the cookies to be completely covered in chocolate.

Step 4: Decorate with Mini Fondant Hearts

Note: Since this cookie set comes in 2 different designs, it is easier to complete the first design and then move on to the second design.

The first design is the cookies decorated with miniature red puffed fondant hearts without the bow. To make the hearts, pinch shape the fondant pieces into smooth balls and then roll the balls into tiny sausages (images 10 & 11).

Next, use a toothpick or a skewer to gently press the center of the sausages to form a dent. In forming the dent, make sure you do not press it too hard that it becomes flat in the center. Suffice if you make a tiny dent (images 12 & 13).

Fold the fondant sausage upwards to form a 'v' shape (image 14). Gently pinch the pointed end to make it nice and pointy and adjust the round tops of the heart until you achieve a cute puffed heart.

(I have a separate tutorial on how to make the puffed hearts and you can read it here).

Mark the dots on the chocolate covered cookies. You can do this with a special tool like the FMM Sugarcraft pattern press tool or free hand it on the cookies (image 15 & 16).

Next attach the fondant hearts on the cookies. To do that, if the chocolate on the cookie as totally set, use a toothpick to apply a tiny amount of chocolate at the back of each heart and attach them to the cookie (images 17 & 18).

Step 5: Make the Red Fondant Bow

Roll some red fondant and cut out a few thin strips in the same width. Place one piece in a slanting position on the cookie. Trim off the excess at the sides. If the chocolate on the cookie has totally set, lightly brush some melted chocolate at the back of the fondant strip before attaching it to the cookie (image 19).

Next, cut out 2 equal sized strips of fondant for the bow loops. Loop them and cut off excess fondant (image 20).

Next, cut out 2 more strips. Place one halfway overlapping on the other (image 21).

Place the loops formed earlier on the strips as shown (image 22).

And wrap the loops. Start with the top. And then wrap the bottom (image 23).

Turn the loops over and use a fondant tool to smooth and adjust the bow (image 24).

Step 6: Attach the Fondant Bow to the Cookies

Before adding the bow onto the cookie, cut out another 2 strips of fondant. For each strip, cut out a tiny triangle piece at the end. Attach them to the slanting fondant strip on the cookie. To hold them in place, use fondant glue (image 25).

And then attach the loops (also with the help of some fondant glue) and adjust the bow so that it is in the exact position you want it to be on the cookie (image 26).

Step 7: Make and Attach the Fondant Puffed Heart

And finally, add a red puffed fondant heart on the top left corner of the cookie. The heart can formed by hand without any tools or cutters just like the miniature red hearts in the first design above (get the fondant heart tutorial here) and attached to the cookie with some melted chocolate (image 27).

And that completes the hearts cookie set for Valentine's Day.