Calvin & Hobbes Cookies Part 4 - Shrunken Heads

This is part 4 in my series of the recreation of various Calvin & Hobbes comics in cookie form.

This week’s Calvin and Hobbes recreation is one of Snicker’s favorites – a snowman in a safari hat with a pot of shrunken heads.  This is the original comic here.

When I started this I made the cookie shapes for several comics at once, and froze the ones I wasn’t yet ready to complete.  Unfortunately, some of them didn’t make it through the freezer very well and were cracked and broken when I took them out. Fortunately, I had made 3 of each cookie anticipating broken cookies, mishaps and minor disasters. That was a very good thing since several key cookies had broken.

Of course with broken cookies there is another advantage. I get to eat the broken ones! Yum! I sometimes end up with a lot of leftover cookies if I don’t need to use the duplicates, but hey, that’s OK. Nothing wrong with extra cookies!

So, here we are. This shows the cookie-recreation in progress – all outlined and waiting to be filled with white frosting. So tasty. So yummy. But no, I can’t eat them yet. Not until after I’m all done!

I wasn’t sure I would be able to get this comic to work with the cookies standing up like my previous recreations because one of the snowmen is holding another cookie. I actually put the stick-arms into the cookie, but it still isn’t strong enough to hold up another cookie. Not to mention how the heck would I balance it there. So, before trying anything that was likely to result in broken cookies, swearing and frosting smeared on the ceilings and walls, I laid them flat and tried it that way. Not bad, but not quite what I wanted.

But then I came up with an excellent solution. With some help from Snickers, some white thread and a lot of patience, we got it to work. The best photo came out somewhat blurry and since I was in too much of a hurry and the frosting wasn’t quite dry yet, when I stood them up to take the photos, there was some drippage. (I don’t care if that’s not a real word. It sounds good, so I’m using it!)

And here’s another shot, a little clearer:

Despite a few issues with balance and dripping, I think it came out pretty well.

And since some of you asked about the recipe I use, here it is:

Butter Cookies
1 ½ cups butter
1 cup sugar
2 egg yolks
½ cup heavy cream
4 ½ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon vanilla

• Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg yolks and mix until blended. Mix in heavy cream and vanilla. Add sifted flour and baking powder and stir until well blended. (I usually just dump in all the flour and then mix it with my hands because the dough is too stiff to use a mixer.)
• Chill the dough for 2-4 hours.
• (After removing it from the refrigerator, depending on how long you refrigerated it you may have to wait until it warms just a bit so you can roll and handle it.)
• Roll the dough out to about ¼ inch thick and cut with cookie cutters.
• Bake in preheated 375 degree oven for 8-10 minutes.
• Makes 8 ½ dozen cookies.

And for the frosting I just used 10x/confectioner’s sugar and water. Add the water slowly until it’s the consistency you want. You can also add a little vanilla or butter rum or lemon for flavor if you want. In this case I didn’t but it is nice with some vanilla. And of course, color it whatever colors you want. If you use liquid food color, keep in mind that will thin it somewhat as well.

I hope you like it. And, as before, stay tuned for more. I have at least four more snowman comic recreations to come, then I plan to tackle some featuring Calvin and Hobbes. I can’t wait to make a Hobbes cookie!


Quack!