Fun NYE Cookies With End of Year Reflection Questions
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The new year is almost here so we have one last cookie theme – New Years Eve cookies! These NYE cookies are extra fun because they have end of year reflection questions.
It’s almost like getting a fortune cookie but this time you can choose what cookie you want to answer.
These NYE cookies are perfect for a NYE party to get everyone talking and reflecting on the past year. The more cookies you make, the better too.
Remember, people start their New Year’s resolutions the day after the NYE party so people are ready to eat some cookies!
I went with a gold luster powder paint and absolutely love them. If you are having a silver or rose gold NYE themed party, switch it up and make that color of luster paint instead. They will look amazing!
I will share my delicious and soft vanilla sugar cookie recipe, buttercream frosting recipe, how to make luster powder paint, and the tutorial for these NYE cookies.
Let’s get started!
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Skip to
- Part 1: Gathering the Supplies for the NYE Cookies
- Part 2: Baking the Cookies, Setting up the Icing Bags, & Making the Luster Paint
- Conversation Starter NYE Cookies with Buttercream Frosting
- Part 3: Choosing Your End of Year Reflection Questions
- Part 4: Decorating the NYE Cookies with Buttercream Frosting
- Save the Tutorial for These NYE Cookies
Part 1: Gathering the Supplies for the NYE Cookies
To decorate these NYE sugar cookies with buttercream frosting, you will want to gather:
- 2 Icing bags
- One Wilton #5 tip and one PME 1.5 tip
- Rectangle cookie cutter
- Black gel food dye
- Projector and projector stand, optional
- Palette knife (I love this one for cookies!)
- Gold luster dust, food-safe fan brush, and small dish
- Ingredients for a crusting buttercream & sugar cookie dough – found below in recipe card
Part 2: Baking the Cookies, Setting up the Icing Bags, & Making the Luster Paint
Use the recipe card below for the sugar cookie and buttercream frosting recipes.
Conversation Starter NYE Cookies with Buttercream Frosting
Equipment
- Stand Mixer with Paddle Attachment
- Rubber Spatula
- Measuring cups and spoons
- Medium Sized Mixing Bowl
- Lined aluminum cookie sheet parchment paper or silicone lined baking sheet
- Rolling Pin
- Cookie cutters and tools see part 1 on this post for the specific tools needed
- Projector optional but recommended if not strong in writing with buttercream
- Projector stand optional
Ingredients
Buttercream Frosting
- ½ cup room temperature unsalted butter 4 ounces
- ½ cup room temperature salted butter 4 ounces
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- 1 tbsp. vanilla extract
- 1-3 tbsp. whole milk
- gold luster powder paint see below the recipe card for directions on how to make
Sugar Cookies
- 1 cup cold salted butter cubed
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 3 cups all purpose flour measured with the scoop & level method
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- 1 egg
- 1.5 tsp. vanilla extract
Instructions
- Remove all of the butter from the refrigerator. You will make the sugar cookies first but the butter for the frosting needs to come to room temperature before mixing.
Sugar Cookies
- Preheat the oven to 350℉ and prepare an aluminum cookie sheet by placing either parchment paper or a silicone baking mat on it.
- In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine the flour and baking powder and mix together. Set this aside.
- Cube a cup of salted butter and then, in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, combine the cubed butter with the granulated sugar. Mix until creamed together well.
- To the stand mixer, add in the egg and vanilla extract and mix until combined.
- Slowly add in the dry ingredients in the mixing bowl to the stand mixer.
- Roll the dough out to 3/8" thick and use the cookie cutters to cut out the cookies. Place the cookies onto the prepared baking sheet and bake for 9-11 minutes or until the tops of the cookies no longer look wet. When baking the cookies, only bake 6-8 cookies at a time to leave proper space between each cookie to cook without spreading. Overcrowding the cookie sheet will cause spread.
Buttercream Frosting
- In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, add the room temperature salted and unsalted butter and mix on high until light and fluffy.
- Mix in the powdered sugar little by little. Add in the vanilla extract and milk about halfway through adding the sugar to help the frosting come together. Start with one tablespoon of milk and work up to three if needed, depending on the consistency you want. I like to aim for a peanut butter consistency or thinner.
- Follow the directions in Part 2 for the specific way you will divide the buttercream and set up the icing bags and how to make the luster powder paint.
How to Decorate the NYE Cookies
- Please refer to Part 4 of this blog post for the step-by-step cookie decorating tutorial.
Notes
Make your buttercream icing according to the recipe and separate it into two bowls:
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- One bowl will only contain about 1/2 cup – dye this bowl black.
- The other bowl will remain undyed, or you can use white food coloring
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Add the PME 1.5 tip to an icing bag and place the black buttercream into it.
Add the Wilton #5 tip to an icing bag and place the white/undyed buttercream into it.
To make the gold luster powder paint:
Add 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract and 1/2 tablespoon of gold luster powder to a small dish. Mix together with the fine point paint brush.
The perfect consistency is that of an acrylic paint. Add more extract or luster powder until you get the perfect consistency.
Keep in mind that the extract will evaporate the longer it sits out so you can also wait it out until you’re ready to use it and see if you need to adjust it.
Part 3: Choosing Your End of Year Reflection Questions
For this tutorial, I chose eight end of year reflection questions. I recommend doing a different question on each cookie to really get your guests talking. You can always have everyone at the party answer each question as well.
Make sure to shorten your question into a 2-3 word prompt rather than a sentence. You will not be able to write small enough to fit a whole sentence onto a cookie unless you’re making big cookies.
I use the Canva app on my iPad and set that up to my projector. I like to use the Canva app because I can pinch to zoom rather than playing with the height of my projector stand every cookie.
Here are my end of year reflection questions/prompts to get you started:
- Best Adventure
- Best Lesson
- Most Valuable Relationship
- Biggest Win
- New Skill Acquired
- Best Memory
- Most Unique Experience
- Most Challenging Moment
Feel free to use any or all of these and to look up some more to get enough for your party guests.
Part 4: Decorating the NYE Cookies with Buttercream Frosting
Check out the video tutorial showing the overall process for decorating the NYE sugar cookies then follow the step-by-step photo series tutorial below.
How to Decorate the New Years Eve Sugar Cookies
- Using the white buttercream, outline and fill in the rectangle sugar cookies. Only do a few cookies at a time before moving to step two so that the frosting doesn’t start to dry.
- Smooth the buttercream with the palette knife & clean up the edges of the cookie if needed.
- With the fan brush and prepared luster powder paint, brush some gold paint onto the smoothed cookies.
- Either by hand or using the projector, write end of the year reflection questions onto the cookies.
That’s it! I really love how simple yet elegant these NYE cookies turned out.
I’d love to know in the comments below, do you participate in NYE parties?
If you are bringing these cookies to a party, make sure to read my post on how to package and transport buttercream sugar cookies.
Save the Tutorial for These NYE Cookies
Use the image below to pin this tutorial for NYE sugar cookies to your holiday board on Pinterest. Alternatively, use any of the social share icons on the top of the page to share it to your favorite social media site.
