How to Make Donut Pinata Cookies with Hani: A Sweet Celebration (Free recipe)

Hello! I'm Hani. It’s nice to meet you. I'm the face and hands behind Domestika's Birthday Cookie Decorating Course, where you can learn how to turn ordinary cookies into edible masterpieces. In my course, I provide you with the tools you need to get started on your cookie-decorating adventure.

What I love about cookie decorating is that anything you can imagine can be transformed into edible cookie art.
With that in mind, today, I will share a fun cookie-decorating project inspired by a cartoon image. We will bake and decorate cookies to celebrate National Donut Day! This donut pinata cookie combines 3 of my favorite things: donuts, lollipops, and pinatas! What’s not to love!? Let's get started.

1. Bake the Cookies

First, you’ll need to bake the cookies. I used a sugar cookie recipe from my Domestika Course, but you can use other cut-out cookie recipes.
Lollipop cookies are easy to make. Gently push the lollipop stick into the cookie before you bake them, and then allow the cookies to cool completely before handling and decorating.
To make one pinata cookie, you’ll need three cookies: 2 complete rounds and 1 round with a hole in the middle to put the sprinkles or candies in.

2. Royal Icing Consistency

To decorate cookies, we’ll use royal icing (get free access to my favorite recipe for royal icing at the bottom of this post), divide it, and color it with gel food colorings: ivory, pink for the donut, yellow, orange, blue, and green for the sprinkles.
To achieve the marbled effect on cookies, I used the wet-on-wet decorating technique using 15-second flood-consistency icing. And you’ll need to thin the icing to about piping consistency to pipe colorful sprinkles.

3. Decorate Cookies

You’ll be surprised how quickly this fun cookie design comes together. That’s why I love the wet-on-wet technique so much. It’s fun, easy, with instant results!
Use a scribe tool to marble icing and let it crust.

After icing crusts, you can add the pink layer with different shades of pink icing to create a classic cartoon look.

Lastly, pipe colorful sprinkles on top of the pink layer and let the icing dry completely before assembling the pinata cookies.

It’s time to assemble pinata cookies. Use icing to glue the cookies together, and don’t forget to put a little surprise inside. I like using small candies, sprinkles, or inspiring messages. What will you fill your donut pinata cookies with? And who will you surprise with your show-stopping cookie masterpieces?

4. Free Downloadable Royal Icing Recipe

To get you started with cookie decorating, I’m sharing my favorite recipe for Royal Icing. And if you need a little more help to bring your cookie designs to life, consider signing up for my Domestika Course “Birthday Cookie Design”. Not only do we get to hang out for a bit, but you also get access to a community forum where you can share your projects and connect with cookie enthusiasts from all over the world. Cookie lovers unite!