Button Cookie Technique
I recently hosted a baby shower for two friends, both of whom are having their second child. Both moms wanted something low key because it was their second child, but I couldn’t have a baby shower without a little bit of a theme. A teenie weenie little smidge of a theme was necessary to elevate the party from potluck brunch to official baby shower. So I went with one I have used before: Cute as a Button. (Shhhhh…don’t tell anyone I reuse party themes. I don’t want Martha to come collect my hot glue gun and revoke my crafting privileges.)
One easy way I incorporated my theme was by making Button Cookies, with the technique taken from Bakerella. Now, she uses a peanut butter cookie box mix for her cookies. Since I didn’t have to do much work for this shower, I made almond butter cookies from scratch. The point of this fact is not horn-tooting, but to let you know I don’t really think it matters too much what cookies you use for this technique. As long as you use a soft cookie recipe without chunks in it, you should be fine.
Button Cookie Technique from Bakerella
- Make whatever smooth cookie dough you want. I have used almond butter, peanut butter, and sugar cookies and all worked well.
- Roll your dough into small balls. I always aim for 1 inch across or less.
- Place 15 – 20 balls on non-stick or lined cookie sheet. You need to work quickly once they are out of the oven so you do not want to overload the cookie sheet.
- Bake for 8-10 minutes at 350 degrees and remove from oven.
- As soon as you remove them from the oven, press down in the center of each cookie with a plastic bottle lid.
- Take a straw and poke four holes out of the center of each cookie.
- Let cool on cookie sheet for a few minutes then remove to a rack to fully cool.
My tips for using this technique
- Have a pair of scissors handy. As you make the holes with the straw, sometimes the straw end starts to melt from the heat of the dough and pan so you will have to snip off pieces of it as you go.
- Because of the reason above, you will need to have 2-4 straws on hand to get through a whole batch of cookies.
- I use straws from the dollar store that have a narrower opening than a standard straw. I found a standard straw made holes that were way too big.
- Do not be embarrassed if you find yourself squeezing the dough that ends up in the straw into your mouth and eating the cookie snake that comes out. You are not alone.