Celebrate National Sugar Cookie Day

Cut-out cookies are generally a type of sugar cookie. The basic recipe used for the recipes in Sweet Talk Cookies by Hayley Callaway is a sugar cookie, though that wouldn't be the recipe I use to test out these ideas. I think "idea" fits much better "recipe" in this cookbook's case because the entries are decoration instruction, not baking instructions. She has a couple of basic recipes and when it isn't insanely hot and humid, I'll try out the chocolate one and share the results with you all. I received this cookbook to test and review on Amazon via their Vine program; this article on The Chocolate Cult is an unexpected bonus for both the publisher and the author. No other form of compensation was received for honestly sharing my experience with this book.

The cookbook is a lovely one to look at because every entry has at least a couple of photos so you can see how to decorate as well as read the instructions. I'm not great at decorating so I make my hubby (who is awesome at it) help me out when I test these types of cookbooks.

There are seven chapters in this book, the first is where traditional recipes can be found for types of frosting and icing as well as three cut-out dough types: Sugar, Gingerbread, and Chocolate. Guess which one I want to experimented with? That's right, Chocolate! I even have it sticky marked so I can once the weather cools down again. Let me start by saying that half to a full pound of butter for each of the dough recipes when they only make 20 cookies seems kind of insane to me, but then I don't use butter often in our house because of cholesterol concerns for some of my family members. I will use butter when I test these out.

The other six chapters are organized by the type of decorative design it covers: Animals, Food, Christmas, Other Holidays, Summer Fun, and Cool Cookies... those last two were kind of odd to me and a way to pull in various ideas more than truly thematic. Given that the summertime is hot and humid where I have always lived, why would you make cookies at all during the summer, let alone cut-out ones which require more time and work? 

In total, I counted 48 decoration instructions. Note: Which specific cookie cutters are used, this book does not give you the information on where to buy that cutter. There are some companies listed in the back of the book where you can find cookie cutters, but it was weird to not list where you could find the specific cutter used in this book.

As food porn, this book is great. As a decorative guide it could be useful, but less useful than I hoped it would be in terms of knowing and finding the tools you will need to use for creating these edible works of art.