Ninja-bread men

You can't catch me I'm the ninja bread man! Nathan got some awesome ninja cookie cutters for Christmas and wanted to try them out for a morning tea he was on at uni. Unfortunately for Nath this coincided with my sprained ankle and he had to cook them himself with me shouting out "helpful" instructions from the dining table. So I can take no credit for the cookies themselves. But I did make the icing and Nath added the artistic sprinkles. Nath used a gingerbread recipe out of a Women's Weekly cookbook and we invented a cream cheese icing to go on top (so much nicer than royal icing!) Here are the recipes:

GINGERBREAD

Ingredients ~

• 125g unsalted butter, softened (put in the microwave for 15secs if you have forgotten)
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 1/2 cups plain flour
• 1 tsp bicarb soda
• 3 tsp ground ginger
• 1/2 cup golden syrup (be generous!)

To Bake ~

• Preheat oven to 180 degrees.
• Beat the butter, sugar and egg yolk in a mix master until smooth. 
• Stir in the sifted dry ingredients and golden syrup until it forms a dough. 
• Flour a dry surface and turn the dough out onto it. Note: be liberal with the flour and flour your hands and the rolling pin as well. If it is a humid day you will need more flour to stop the dough from sticking. 
• Knead the dough until it is smooth. 
• Roll the dough out until 0.5cm thick and then cut out into desired shapes. Note: flour the cookie cutters too this well make things so much easier.
• Place on cookie trays about 5cm apart (there is a lot of butter in this mix so the trays should not need greasing or lining).
• Bake for about 10mins or until starting to turn golden.
• Let cool on the trays, loosen with an egg flip after about 5mins to ensure they don't stick.
• Cool completely before icing. 

ICING 

Ingredients ~

• 30 g unsalted butter, softened
• 80g cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup icing sugar, sifted
• Food colouring of choice

To Make ~

• Beat the butter and cream cheese in the mix master until light and fluffy.
• Add the icing sugar (half a cup at a time) and mix in well.
• Ad food colouring slowly so you get the right colour. Mix though well.

Now it is time to ice your biscuits. This will work a lot better if you have a small metal spatula but you could use a butter knife. Take about 1tsp of icing on the spatula and place in the middle of the biscuit and then spread out towards the edges. Use the edge of the spatula and run around the edges of the cookie to make sure you have a nice finish at the edge. Decorate with sprinkles or lollies if you like :) 

kapow!