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Author: Creative Team
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4.41 from 15 votes
Turkey handprint cookies are a fun Thanksgiving treat that your kids will love to make. These sugar cookies are sure to be a hit during the holiday.
Looking for more unique ways to adds some festive flair to your Thanksgiving Day table? Here are a few more of our favorite Thanksgiving Turkey Treats – Easy Nutter Butter Turkey Cookies, Turkey Oreo Pops, and the Easiest Turkey Sugar Cookies.
An Adorable Thanksgiving Cookie
It’s almost Halloween, but I’m sure you are all done with your Halloween cookies already, so why not make some Turkey Handprint Cookies!? (I know you are totally on top of your holiday game! Me… not so much. I’m still making costumes.)
There’s just something about handprint turkeys that are irresistibly darling. They always have character. Some have ginormous gobblers, some have feathers that look like porcupine quills and still- they are cute enough to put in a frame and cry over!
Handprint turkeys are an oldie but goodie that never go out of style!I’m pretty much in love with these! They are one of my favorites that I’ve ever made! They are a fun party favor, and how perfect would they be as a “place card” on your Thanksgiving table?
How to Make Turkey Handprint Cookies
Make Sugar Cookie Dough – Buy or make your favorite sugar cookie dough. If you need a delicious recipe, this is my favorite one for Sugar Cookies.
Make A Handprint – First, trace your child’s hand onto a piece of card stock. Next, cut out each of the handprints. Place the paper hand over the sugar cookie dough and then use a knife to cut the dough out.
Bake – Carefully transfer the dough to the cookie sheet so the turkey handprint doesn’t break. The bake the cookies according to the recipe or package instructions. Let the cookies fully cool before you start decorating them.
Icing – If you want to make your own icing, go ahead and do that while your cookies are baking and cooling. Here’s a great Royal Icing recipe or just use store bought.
Decorate – First, you’ll want to outline the turkey handprint cookie with either brown or black icing. Next, fill in the cookie with a thin layer of brown icing. You’ll want to make sure the icing used for the outline and details of the turkey cookie are thicker than the fill icing. To thin out the icing, just add a little bit of water to the icing you’re using. Make sure you pop any bubbles that form right away while it’s still wet.
Gobblers & Feet – Make the gobblers and feet for your turkey cookies by making them on a piece of parchment paper. You’ll need to let these dry for several hours before you can peel them off and place them on your cookies. You’ll want to add these last to your cookies because they’re fragile and could break while you’re decorating.
Details – Once your fill frosting has set just a little, add the chocolate covered sunflower seeds to make the turkey feathers. If you place them too soon, they’ll sink into the icing but if you wait too long the frosting will crack when you put them on. Use black icing to write your child’s name on the cookie
More Thanksgiving Ideas
- Pilgrim Hat Cookies
- Printable Thanksgiving Pictionary Game
- Thanksgiving Count Your Blessing Tree Activity
- Candy Bar Wrappers For Thanksgiving
Aren’t they darling?!? Leave us a comment below and let us know how they turned out. Or snap a picture and tag us on social media so we can see your darling creations!
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Turkey Handprint Sugar Cookie Recipe
Servings: 1 cookie
Turkey Handprint Cookies are a delightful Thanksgiving treat that your friends and family will surely GOBBLE up!
Prep Time:5 hours hrs
Decorating Time:30 minutes mins
Total Time:5 hours hrs 30 minutes mins
Ingredients
- cardstock
- pencil or pen
- scissors
- sugar cookie dough, try our favorite homemade sugar cookie recipe, or you can use store-bought dough
- rolling pin
- knife
- baking sheet with non-stick liner
- icing or frosting, use our royal icing recipe with helpful tips, or purchase your favorite
- water, to thin out the royal icing
- toothpicks
- parchment paper
- chocolate covered sunflower seeds
Instructions
Using a pen or pencil, trace your child's hand onto a piece of cardstock. (If you have different sized hands in your house, it's fun to make different sizes.)
Cut each hand out.
Roll out your sugar cookie dough, place the cardstock hands on top of the dough to use as a guide and cut them out with a knife.
Carefully transfer to baking sheet. If there are any rough edges, just pat them down.
Bake, let cool, then carefully transfer to your counter where you can start to decorate them. (Try not to have any finger casualties.)
Outline the handprint cookies in black or brown icing. NOTE - The icing for the outline, feet, gobbler and name should be thicker than the fill icing.
Fill each handprint cookie with the thinner brown frosting. (Just add a touch more water to the thick stuff you made.)
Pop the bubbles with a toothpick right away when it's still really wet.
Make some feet and gobblers with icing on a piece of parchment paper. After they are dry (several hourthey will peel right off.
After your fill frosting has set up a tiny bit, add sunflower seed feathers. If you add these too soon, they will fall into the frosting and get swallowed up. But don't wait too long so that the icing cracks when you push these on.
Using black icing, write the name and add an eye. Glue your dried gobbler on with a dot of frosting.
With dots of frosting, put the legs on last. I learned the hard way they they are fragile and if you try to do other decorating after you put them on, your hand might break them.
Nutrition
Serving: 1 Cookie · Calories: 279 kcal
Other Notes
Course: Dessert
Cuisine: American
Keyword: fall, thanksgiving
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Ashleigh is the creative baker fromBee in Our Bonnet. She was on theSomewhat Simple Creative Team, sharing darling cookie and dessert tips and ideas!
This post originally published on SomewhatSimple in October 2011.
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