BY MARILYNN VANDERSTAY

They stood in line to get a glimpse of them at Sheldon Kagan’s Salon de la Mariée last month. Corporations are placing orders for dozens of them daily. And small business owners are using them as business cards to get their foot in the door. NDG’s diva of delicious, Donna Malin, the queen of sugarless chocolate cakes, has recently put her hand to cookies and her Cookie Studio can barely keep up with the demand.

After years of working exclusively in chocolate, last summer Malin began experimenting with the fine art of gingerbread baking. She converted her kitchen into a cookie studio and tried out and developed tried-and-true favourite recipes until she found one that would please even the most finicky gourmand.





Beyond gingerbread men and women she started playing with shapes and sizes, as visions of cookie shapes danced in her head. Bouquets of hearts and stars, balloons and birthday cakes on sticks in baskets for birthday giving. Baskets of decorated houses in all shapes and sizes for housewarming gifts. And finally her pièce de resistance, the cookie business card decorated with the company logos and contact information. Companies and their clients began to eat them up.

When she decided to take a booth at the Salon de la Mariée Malin’s creative flow began to think weddings. She created exclusive bonboniers filled with cartoon brides and grooms and monogram letters, and then had the idea to personalize the wedding parties decorated with the exact outfits and names and dates. Guests can even enjoy edible table cards and centre pieces.

Hansel and Gretel would have loved to eat their way through Malin’s studio which today is filled with the wonderful scents of gingerbread and sugar cookies as Malin’s cookie studio has become an offsite branch of Santa’s workshop. Three dimensional colourful Christmas trees made with 16 cookies are lined up on counters alongside baskets of smaller Christmas trees, stockings, candy canes, and snowflakes. For Chanukah eating and giving she offers menorahs and drieidles, all of which she can ship anywhere in Canada.

Special orders can include personalized ornaments with names of family members, In fact she can personalize any cookie into a photo cookie with the image printed on edible paper with edible ink.

“There is still time before the holidays for special orders,� says Malin.� We just need 48 hours to personalize. We can ship orders for Christmas across Canada until Dec. 15 a

nd the studio will stay open until 3 p.m on Dec. 24 for last minute gift purchases.�

The Cookie Studio, which is located at 5958A Monkland Avenue, is open noon to 6 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday until Christmas. “The public is invited to come in Saturday afternoons and taste our gingerbread cookies with a cup of candy cane hot chocolate,� says Malin.



• For more information phone The Cookie Studio at 514-486-3737 or go to www.cookiestudio.ca.">www.cookiestudio.ca.">www.cookiestudio.ca.