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Spider Web Halloween Sugar Cookies

Wow your family and guests with these spooky spider web Halloween sugar cookies, using the best royal icing
5 from 2 votes
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Prep Time: 1 hour
Cook Time: 12 minutes
Total Time: 1 hour 12 minutes
Servings: 24 cookies
Author:Andrea

Ingredients

For the sugar cookies

  • 2.5 cups all purpose flour
  • ½ teaspoon baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup butter unsalted, softened
  • ¾ cup granulated sugar
  • 1 egg room temperature
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract can also use almond extract

For the royal icing

  • 4 cups powdered sugar
  • 2 egg whites
  • 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
  • pinch of salt
  • food coloring

Instructions

To make sugar cookies

  • Heat oven to 350. Mix flour, baking powder and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside.
  • In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar on medium-high speed, till thoroughly mixed, about 2-3 minutes. Add the egg and vanilla and beat on medium speed, scraping the sides of the bowl with a spatula as needed.
  • Gently add the dry ingredients and beat on low speed until just combined, making sure to scrape bowl as needed so that everything gets well combined.
  • Separate dough into 2 balls and wrap in plastic wrap. Flatten out into a somewhat imperfect disc, so that it will chill quicker. Refrigerate for about 30 minutes till firm.
  • Remove 1 disc of dough at a time and unwrap. With a rolling pin, roll out dough to about ¼-inch thickness on a floured work surface.
  • To make the spider web designs, simply cut out round circles using a glass or round cookie cutter. 
  • Set cookie cutouts on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper or a silicone mat. Make sure to leave about 1.5″ space between cookies as they will expand. Bake for 12-14 minutes at 350 degrees f, till cookies are light golden brown.
  • Allow to cool on a wire rack before icing. If cookies are too warm when iced, the icing will run all over and not harden.

To make royal icing

  • In a large bowl, add 4 cups of powdered sugar, 2 egg whites, 1 teaspoon of cream of tartar, and a pinch of salt. Whisk with an electric mixer or stand mixer until all ingredients are combined.
  • If the icing is too runny, add ¼ cup of powdered sugar at a time, adding no more than ½ cup. Typically, the most you will need to add is ¼ cup additional sugar to achieve the correct consistency.
  • Separate icing into small bowls if you want to create different colors, adding food coloring till desired color is achieved.

Making spider web Halloween sugar cookies

  • To create really clean lines and a great looking spider web, use two different sized piping tips, a #4 or #5 for the white icing, which will be the background of the web. Use a smaller #2 tip for the orange and black icing, creating the thin lines of the actual web.
  • Add icing colors to reusable icing bottles or disposable piping bags.
  • Begin by outlining the cookie with the white icing, then flood icing. Squeeze out a good amount of icing and push it around a bit until the entire circle is filled in to the edge of your cookie. 
  • Once the cookie is filled with white icing, immediately pipe on the web dot and circles as you don't want the base color to start to harden at all. Begin with a small dot in the middle (about the size of a very small pea), then pipe in 3 concentric circles.
  • Then you take a toothpick or scribe tool, and beginning at the dot, drag through the icing towards the outer edge. Continue this dragging motion all the way around until your web is complete.

Video

Notes

If you notice that the icing has thickened too much, simply add some water, ½ teaspoon at a time, and stir. You will typically only need a teaspoon of water or less to get it loosened up a bit for piping.
Alternately, it is not uncommon to get the perfect consistency, only for it to become too runny when you add liquid food coloring. If your icing becomes too runny, simply stir in more powdered sugar, starting with a couple of teaspoons at a time, until you again have the correct consistency.
Store cookies in an airtight container for up to 1 week.

Nutrition

Calories: 222kcal | Carbohydrates: 36g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 8g | Saturated Fat: 5g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.4g | Monounsaturated Fat: 2g | Trans Fat: 0.3g | Cholesterol: 27mg | Sodium: 126mg | Potassium: 44mg | Fiber: 0.4g | Sugar: 26g | Vitamin A: 246IU | Calcium: 11mg | Iron: 1mg
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