Mini foods are just more fun, aren’t they?

I think there should be a few more cookies in the world, especially if they're mini.

Am I the only one that seems to have rose-colored childhood food memories? I mean, I know that I’m repeating myself, plus, I’m pretty sure that in most cases my memory is way over exaggerated, but it’s easy to forget this and get stuck craving an old favorite treat and wanting it to taste exactly like it used to.

I recently remembered this one food memory that stood out in particular, gem cookies. My mom had this friend who would bring her these delicious little bite-size cookies from a local bakery near her house and every time I saw that familiar white paper bag with the pink letters I would get so excited because I knew they were those cookies.

I wanted to do my best to recreate the specific flavor of these little sweets because they were so good! They weren’t your typical dry, crusty frosted shortbreads, they were melt-in-your mouth buttery and had the perfect ratio of frosting to cookie. Plus, the itty-bittyness of them made them perfect for popping into your mouth one right after another. So addictive.

Something else that was kind of unique to said cookies was the icing that was tall and buttery, yet it didn’t smash when you piled the cookies into a bag. I’ve never made a frosting with all of these characteristics but I was determined to find one. I knew that it would need to have egg whites or meringue powder in order to dry hard but it also needed to be thick and pipe-able like buttercream. My final result seemed pretty close to what I was going for so I’m pretty happy with it.

I actually made these weeks ago, but I had so many recipes that I wanted to post that I thought I’d push these back a bit and save them for now. Seeing them all clustered together kind of reminds me of fireworks so I thought they would be fitting for any celebration. The fun thing about them is that you can make them any color you want so they are the perfect little treat to share with friends and family all year long. Just think how cute pastels would be for Easter or red white and blue for summer! I personally went with pink and brown because those were the easiest colors to make all-natural since I used beet puree and cocoa.

And of course, if you don’t feel like taking the time to make them so small, feel free to make them as big as you’d like. I don’t have a cookie cutter the size that I wanted so I used the back of a piping tip and it worked really well to get the tiny circles (except for the few the wanted to get stuck, but you just have to push them out with a toothpick). I can be a bit persistent when I set my mind on an idea #Obsessive Much.

However you want to do them is up to you. I just really hope you love them!

As always, the recipe is available upon request. The first request gets an upvote.

ALL CONTENT IS MINE AND ORIGINAL! All of these food photos were taken with my Nikon D5300 and my favorite Lens, the Nikon AF-S FX NIKKOR 50mm f/1.8G. You can find out more in my INTRO POST. And by the way, my intro post did a huge $0.21