Chess or Checkers Cookies

This yummy checkers board is made from the Roll Out Sugar Cookies with Royal Icing and a colored candy like Skittles or M&M's.

For this cookie I cut the dough into squares and baked them.  Dye some of the royal icing with black coloring.  I find that the easiest way to do this is to use Wilton's Black Ready-To-Use Icing.  I then used some edible markers and a ruler to make a grid pattern on each cookie.  Now, I didn't do this, but I should have made a black outline around the edges of the cookies BEFORE filling the grid.  That would have made the cookie look nicer.  

Next I filled in each square alternating between black and white icings.  I did this as quickly as possible because the icing will start to crust and the finished product will have ridges.  Now that wouldn't be bad, but I wanted a seamless look like a real chess board.  When this is all done, I let them dry for about 24 hours.

When everything was dry, I placed the colored candies on the spaces.  All done!  This is a fun way to play and eat with your treats!

*I know that I made a chess board but used checkered pieces, if you want to have red squares instead of white either dye the royal icing red before decorating or use a red edible marker to color the dried white squares.

Yummy Royal Icing

This recipe is also from The Decorated Cookie (she is AMAZING!).  The original recipe is Here

Ingredients

4 tablespoons of meringue powder

1/2 cup of water

2 Tablespoons of Crisco

2 tablespoons of light corn syrup

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

7-8 cups of powdered sugar (sifted)

Directions

First whip the meringue powder with the water for a several minutes until it is fluffy and forms peaks.  One way to know it is done is if the bowl is turned upside down, nothing falls out. I use a stand mixture with the whisk attachment, but it can be done with a hand mixture as well, it will just take a bit longer.  When that is done add the next 3 ingredients and mix.  Finally add the sifted powdered sugar.

*The normal consistency is thick.  If you want a stiffer consistency, add more powdered sugar, for a thinner one add more corn syrup.  DO NOT add any more water, that causes a kind of cracked, discolored look when dry.  Also this icing does harden enough to stack the cookies on each other but it is not a hard as normal royal icing.  I have found that this icing is not great for pipping 3D decorations like roses.  This royal icing is more appropriate for that.