Drop of Disney

It’s National Watermelon Day! Watermelon is one of my favorite fruits. Much to my dismay, we don’t have watermelon in the house right now, and so I couldn’t resist celebrating today with these Mickey Watermelon Cookies! These sweet vanilla sugar cookies are decorated with brightly colored icing to look like watermelon slices, complete with Mickey shaped sprinkle seeds!

These vanilla sugar cookies are some of my favorites. I use this recipe all of the time when I want to make cut-out cookies but if you’d like other flavors, you can also try my lemon cut-out cookies or my spiced brown sugar cookies. Or you can also use your favorite pre-made sugar cookie dough and just decorate them!

To make the cookies, first combine the flour, salt, and baking soda in a small bowl. Then, beat the butter and sugar in a medium bowl until light and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla extract and then beat until well combined.

Add the flour mixture, beating until well combined and a nice dough forms. Transfer the dough to flat work surface and press into a rectangle about 1-inch thick. This will make it a bit easier to roll out later. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and chill for 1 hour.

Place the chilled dough on a lightly floured surface and roll out to about 1/4 inch thickness. Cut into shapes using a triangle shaped cookie cutter. I used the triangle cutter from this American Crafts Sweet Sugarbelle Set. Place the cut-out cookies on baking sheets lined with parchment paper and chill for 15 minutes. This will help the cookies keep their shape.

Bake the chilled cookies at 350 F for 8-10 minutes or until the edges are light golden. Cool the cookies for 2 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

While the cookies are cooling, make the royal icing. I generally prefer to use meringue powder for my royal icing as I find it easier to use than fresh egg whites. To start, whisk together the powdered sugar and meringue powder.

Add 1/4 cup of warm water and beat on low speed until well-mixed. Then, beat on high speed until the icing is glossy and holds stiff peaks. Stir in additional warm water, a tablespoon at a time, until icing creates loose ribbons when drizzled with a spoon. Aim to have the icing ribbons disappear back into the bowl within 10 seconds of being picked up with the spoon.

Divide the icing into three bowls, placing smaller amounts of icing into two bowls (for the two greens) and a larger amount in the third bowl (for the pinkish red). Cover the bowls with plastic wrap when not working with them so they don’t start to harden.

Using gel food coloring, dye one of the smaller bowls dark green and the other smaller bowl light green. For my dark green, I used Americolor’s leaf green. For the light green, I used a combination of the leaf green and the green from Wilton’s primary color set.

The larger bowl of icing will be used for the watermelon flesh so it should be a pinkish red. To make this color, I used a combination of the pink from the Wilton neon color set and Americolor’s super red.

Once the icing colors are mixed, transfer them to piping bags fitted with small to medium round piping tips. Since I only have one small size tip, I used a coupler to make it easier to transfer the tip between bags.

To decorate the cookies, pipe and fill a small dark green rectangle along the top flat edge of the triangle to make the rind. Do this for all of the cookies so that they have time to dry a little bit before the light green section. Pipe and fill a small light green rectangle under the dark green section to finish the rind. Again, do this for all of the cookies before moving onto the watermelon flesh.

For the watermelon flesh, pipe and fill a large triangle, following the edges of the cookies. Before the icing sets completely, place the Mickey shaped sprinkles to make the seeds. For these cookies, I used the black Mickey sprinkles from the Disney Eats collection at Target. I don’t think they’re still available there, but there are similar ones on Amazon. Let the cookies dry completely before stacking or storing so that the icing doesn’t smudge.

Enjoy!

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Mickey Watermelon Cookies

Happy Watermelon Day! Celebrate the perfect summer fruit with these Mickey Watermelon Cookies! These sugar cookies are topped with colorful icing and Mickey shaped sprinkle seeds.

Course Dessert

Keyword Sugar Cookies

Prep Time 30 minutes

Cook Time 8 minutes

Rest Time 1 hour

Servings 18 cookies

Ingredients

Sugar Cookies

• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Royal Icing

• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 ½ tablespoons meringue powder
• ¼ – ½ cup warm water
• green gel food coloring
• pink gel food coloring
• red gel food coloring

Equipment

• triangle cookie cutter
• piping bags
• small and medium round piping tips

Decorations

• Mickey Mouse sprinkles

Instructions

Sugar Cookies

1. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking soda.
2. In a medium bowl, beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.
3. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until combined.
4. Add the flour mixture and beat until well combined.
5. Transfer dough to a flat work surface and press into a rectangle about 1-inch thick. Wrap dough in plastic wrap and chill for 1 hour.
6. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
7. Place dough on a lightly floured surface and roll out to about ¼ thickness. Cut into shapes using the triangle cookie cutter.
8. Place cut out cookies on prepared baking sheets and chill for 15 minutes.
9. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until the edges are light golden.
10. Let cookies cool for 2 minutes on the baking sheets before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Royal Icing

1. In a medium bowl, whisk together the powdered sugar and meringue powder.
2. Add ¼ cup of warm water and beat on low speed until well combined. Beat on high speed until glossy and the icing holds stiff peaks.
3. Stir in additional warm water, a tablespoon at a time, until icing creates loose ribbons when drizzled with a spoon. Aim to have the icing ribbons disappear back into the bowl within 10 seconds of being picked up with the spoon.
4. Divide the icing into three bowls, placing smaller amounts of icing into two bowls (for the two greens) and a larger amount in the third bowl (for the pinkish red). Cover the bowls with plastic wrap when not working with them.
5. Using the green gel food coloring, dye one of the smaller bowls dark green and the other smaller bowls light green. Dye the last bowl a pinkish red color using a combination of pink and red gel food coloring.
6. Transfer icing to piping bags fitted with round piping tips. If you only have one round piping tip, use a coupler so you can easily transfer the tip between bags.

Assembly

1. Pipe and fill a small dark green rectangle around the back edge of the triangle cookies. This will be the watermelon rind. Pipe this section on all of the cookies before moving onto the light green.
2. Pipe and fill a small light green rectangle right below the dark green.This will be the second part of the watermelon rind. Pipe this section on all of the cookies before moving onto the pinkish red.
3. Pipe and fill a large triangle below the light green section, following the edge of the cookie. This will be the watermelon flesh.
4. Add a few Mickey shaped sprinkles to the watermelon flesh to make watermelon seeds.
5. Let dry completely before stacking or storing cookies.