baby shower cookies

Makes 20

Preparation time 1 hour, plus cooling and setting

Cooking time 15 minutes

butter, for greasing

1 quantity Vanilla Cookie Dough, chilled (see page 230)

flour, for dusting

1 quantity Royal Icing (see page 15)

5 pink jelly beans, halved lengthwise

75 g (3 oz) pale blue, pink or yellow ready-to-roll icing

10 small blue, pink or yellow ribbon bows

Copy the bootie and bottle shapes opposite to make simple templates. Grease 2 baking sheets. Roll out the cookie dough thinly on a lightly floured surface. Lay the templates over the dough and, using a small, sharp knife or scalpel, cut around them. Place on the baking sheets, spacing them slightly apart, and reroll the trimmings to make 20 in all.

Bake in a preheated oven, 180°C (350°F), Gas Mark 4, for 15 minutes, or until pale golden. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Place a little of the royal icing in a piping bag fitted with a fine plain nozzle. Add a few drops of water to the remaining icing until the icing forms a flat surface when left to stand for 15 seconds.

Pipe a line of icing around the edges of the cookies. Pipe a line of circles across the ankles of the booties and a diagonal line of piping across the centre of the bottles. Using a small teaspoon, drizzle a little of the thinned icing onto the lower part of the bottles, spreading it to the edges with the back of a teaspoon and easing it into the corners with a cocktail stick. Spread the icing onto the bootie-shaped cookies in the same way, easing it around the piping across the ankles.

Secure a jelly-bean half, cut side down, to the top of each bottle with a little icing. Shape a little band of ready-to-roll icing and secure around the neck of the bottles. Leave for 30 minutes leave for 30 minutes. Pipe white decorative lines and secure bows with dots of icing to finish the booties and pipe ready-to-use icing on the bottles. Leave to set again for 30 minutes.