Fun and Delicious Dessert Recipes
Whether you like to celebrate Valentine’s Day, Galentine’s Day or both, heart cookies are always a fun treat to make. These cookies have that classic heart shape, but have an added sense of flair with a ruffled, ribbon-like border. I’ll show you how to use certain piping tips to create that ruffled effect.
You can use just about any sugar cookie dough recipe, as long as it works well for cut-out sugar cookies. I recommend chilling half of the dough while you roll out and cut out the other half. This will help make sure that you always have cold dough to work with. Make sure to chill the cookies again before popping them in the oven to bake them.
Any sort of buttercream recipe will work, as long as it is well chilled and has enough powdered sugar to help it keep its shape once it is piped. If your buttercream becomes too warm while you are piping the borders, pop it back into the fridge to chill it more. If you decide to color your buttercream, add a few drops of food coloring to it and gently stir it in until it is fully colored.
Once your buttercream is ready to go, carefully frost each cookie. You just need a thin layer to ensure that the sugar has something to stick to. Don’t worry too much about this looking too neat because it won’t show once it is topped with sprinkles.
I recommend using sugar sprinkles for these cookies because they will give you the cleanest look. You can also use jimmies if you like, but they will leave some gaps and show more of the buttercream underneath.
Once you’ve chosen your sprinkles, fill the bowls with your different options and carefully dip your cookies into them to ensure that all of the buttercream is completely covered. You can even spoon more sprinkles onto the cookies before gently shaking off the excess to help make sure they are well coated.
The piping tips you’ll need will depend on the size of your cookie cutters and how large of a ribbon border you want each cookie to have. Any of Wilton’s or Ateco’s leaf tips, #65-70 or #112-115 will create that ribbon-like border. I used various sizes for the cookies I made and found that #65-70 and #112, were the best options, while #113-#115 created a really large border and would require a much bigger cookie.
Once your piping bag has its piping tip in place and is loaded with buttercream and your cookies have been frosted and dipped in colored sugars, you are ready to start piping! I recommend first piping a small amount of frosting on some parchment to practice. You’ll need to gently apply pressure to the bag, moving the bag up and down slightly as you go to create ripples in the frosting, similar to a ruffled ribbon.
Once you’re ready to start piping on the cookies, hold the piping bag so that the outside of the tip aligns with the edge of the cookie and does not hang over past the edge of the cookie.
It’s important that it does not hang over the edge of the cookie or it will become too heavy and fall off as you go. You’ll also want to make sure to stay on top of the cookie and not pick up any of the sprinkles with your piping tip as you go.
You’ll start at the top right side of the heart, carefully turning the cookie as you go until you reach the bottom right side of the point. Next, you’ll start piping back up the left side of the cookie, turning the cookie again as you go until you reach the top again. 
Make sure to release the pressure you’re applying to the bag at the right moment so the frosting meets up with where you started. If there are any mistakes, you can always use a toothpick to lift some of the frosting off and redo any section that you need to.
I love these cookies because you can make the ruffled, ribbon-like border look as neat or as whacky as you like with tighter ruffles or looser ruffles. You can also switch out larger or smaller piping tips with different sized cookies to create larger or smaller ruffled borders. There are a lot of different options, but either way you’ll end up with beautiful heart cookies that are ready to be shared.
Whether you like to celebrate Valentine’s Day, Galentine’s Day or both, heart cookies are always a fun treat to make. These cookies have that classic heart shape, but have an added sense of flair with a ruffled, ribbon-like border. I’ll show you how to use certain piping tips to create that ruffled effect.
Keywords: heart, cookies, ruffled, valentine's day, tutorial
