Back in February I made unicorn poop cookies from this Instructable, because they were too awesome not to make. Since then, that single post brings in more views to my blog than any other one. (Dead Whale Tales is the other popular one, which sure says something about people on the internets.) I think it’s mostly Google image search bringing up my fantabulous photo, but I’m taking it as a sign that people are probably interested in seeing the other colorful cookies I have made.

A few weeks back I made a batch of rainbow cookies to add to the dessert table at a lovely island wedding here in the Seattle area. It was a little time consuming, but not complex, and so when I made cookies again this week for a fundraiser for my martial arts school, I used the same technique and photo documented.

I used the sugar cookie recipe from Joy of Cooking, which is my standby for baking.  I made a double batch and used my scale to divide it into four equal parts. Then I mixed food coloring into three parts, and put them to chill overnight in the fridge. The next morning I had these lovely things, and great morning light to do photos.

When I made unicorn poop, there was a lot of rolling the dough into snakes, and I tried that the first time I was making rolled rainbow cookies. Very time consuming. Fortunately, there is a faster way!

Take a knife and cut some slices off, a little thicker than you want your rolled out dough to be.

Then cut the slices into strips. (I said this was “faster,” not “fast.” If you just want square rainbows, try this way.) Lay the strips out in rainbow order, or whatever strikes your fancy.

I did this on wax paper so that if it started to get too warm, I could easily slide it onto a cookie sheet and set it in the freezer for a few minutes while I checked what was going on on the facebooks. Or the tumblrs. Or the twitters. Or occasionally the pinterests. I am all about the social medias, which are all plural, of course, because they’re on the internets.

Anyway, once you’ve got a nice amount of stripes…

…then it is time to apply the rolling pin.

And of course, the cookie cutter.

Then you put those suckers on a cookie sheet, and bake according the recipe. Hopefully you don’t have an ancient oven like the one in our apartment that takes an hour to preheat. :6

But wait, you say. After I cut out one set of cookies, am I supposed to line up the little bits somehow? What do I do with the leftover dough?

Don’t worry! You can roll them out again and you will be able to make a tray of marbled, swirly rainbow cookies. They are beautiful in their own way, but maybe especially if you’re using a constrained palette of colors. A full rainbow will, of course, descend into a muddy muddle if mixed and rerolled too many times. So, cut out all your striped rainbow cookies first and save all the bits to roll out again at the very end to minimize the mixing.

In the end, you get trays of colorful cookies, to eat or share or make little dioramas with. I’m not judging.

You can also apply some shiny sparkly edible decorating gel, similar to the unicorn poop. I did this with the wedding cookies, but it makes them a little sticky if you don’t wait for the gel to completely dry, so I didn’t bother with the stars.

Whatever you do with your cookies, you should know that transporting them in a shoebox on the back of bike will only lead to tears. And crumbs.

Oops.

Actually, I made so many that a respectable number survived, and there were even some left over after last night’s event. I just want you to know that sugar cookies are sweet and delicate and brittle, and need to be packaged securely if you’re going by bike over potholes. Learn from my successes and my mistakes, people, and enjoy some pretty cookies!