Julia,
Well...I can answer some of this...
The baker arrives @ the shop very early in the morning, and looks at the orders to be delivered that day, and gets all the appropriate shapes cut n baked first thing. He's 90% done by 7:30am. They're put on covered cooling racks for the decorators when they come in. Decorators then take a look at the orders, and divide the work up into similar cookies/ colors so as not to have much, if any duplication of effort.
The drying time question is the difficult one, because their icing recipe is probably THE most-guarded secret of the company. I don't know how they get the soft inside of the icing, but crusted and set enough to hold its shape. Not having tried the crusting BC recipe from CC, I couldn't say if it's a close match, or not. Something worth investigating, at any rate.
They do not "paint" their icing onto the cookies. Background colors, if any, are spread with small, broad spats, akin to spreaders without the "teeth" on one side. That sets for a few minutes, then the other details are piped on.
Placed back onto cooling racks, the cookies wait to be assembled into bouquets and delivered.
Now they usually have 2 deliveries per day. One in the morning, with cookies done the day before. (sometimes, with breakage during decorating or packaging, cookies must be decorated "on-the-fly" first thing to complete those orders.) Then they have the afternoon delivery of cookies made that day.
I hope this helps answer some of what you're looking for. If there's anything else you can think of, PM me, and I'll do my best to provide further info.
~ Scott
Well...I can answer some of this...
The baker arrives @ the shop very early in the morning, and looks at the orders to be delivered that day, and gets all the appropriate shapes cut n baked first thing. He's 90% done by 7:30am. They're put on covered cooling racks for the decorators when they come in. Decorators then take a look at the orders, and divide the work up into similar cookies/ colors so as not to have much, if any duplication of effort.
The drying time question is the difficult one, because their icing recipe is probably THE most-guarded secret of the company. I don't know how they get the soft inside of the icing, but crusted and set enough to hold its shape. Not having tried the crusting BC recipe from CC, I couldn't say if it's a close match, or not. Something worth investigating, at any rate.
They do not "paint" their icing onto the cookies. Background colors, if any, are spread with small, broad spats, akin to spreaders without the "teeth" on one side. That sets for a few minutes, then the other details are piped on.
Placed back onto cooling racks, the cookies wait to be assembled into bouquets and delivered.
Now they usually have 2 deliveries per day. One in the morning, with cookies done the day before. (sometimes, with breakage during decorating or packaging, cookies must be decorated "on-the-fly" first thing to complete those orders.) Then they have the afternoon delivery of cookies made that day.
I hope this helps answer some of what you're looking for. If there's anything else you can think of, PM me, and I'll do my best to provide further info.
~ Scott
Our perfect companions never have fewer than four feet. - Colette
Our perfect companions never have fewer than four feet. - Colette
