Move over Mom: 'Minecraft' Creeper Cookie explodes with flavor
When my mom told me the topic of this edition was “Jeepers Creepers” I immediately thought about "Minecraft," a video game that I was playing with my obsessed little brother.
"Minecraft" is a game with 8-bit game pixelation that looks old-fashioned, something like "Space Invaders." It is a good game where pretty much anything is possible. There's creative mode and survival mode. In creative mode you can create anything, from castles to roller coasters. In survival mode you have to survive the night by building a house or shelter and hiding from the monsters.
The monsters are called Creepers. If a Creeper gets too close it can blow you up or destroy your stuff. I decided I would create a Creeper Cookie for Halloween because it just felt like it fit.
I thought the base should be a sugar cookie, because sugar cookies explode with flavor. I decided to use fondant for the pixels because it's easy to work with to create the squares. Fondant is like a sugary Play-Doh, but edible. You can mold it into pretty much any shape you want and roll it out quite thin, which is how we used it.
A word from Mom: Fondant is the pliable “frosting” of sorts that you see on magazine-worthy wedding cakes and creations that come out of the Cake Boss' bakery.
It's easy to be intimidated by all that, but don't be. You can buy pre-made fondant at baking supply and craft stores and there are dozens of tools to help you color, mold and shape it. It really is just like molding clay.
Jerome hardly noticed he used math skills (on a Sunday, no less!) to determine how many fondant pixels he needed for Creeper's face; he was too busy having fun coloring, rolling and cutting out (and eating!) the fondant. You could say he was playing in creative mode that afternoon.
Ÿ Jerome Gabriel, an eighth-grader, has been helping in the kitchen since he could hold a spoon. His mom, Deborah Pankey, is the Daily Herald food editor.