This easy, half-homemade Mardi Gras and New Orleans inspired recipe is perfect for celebrating Mardi Gras at home. These Mardi Gras cookies with rum frosting come together in under an hour.
Laissez bons temps rouler, friends! Which roughly translates to let the good times roll! I decided to get into the Mardi Gras state of mind with some Mardi Gras inspired sugar cookies topped off with lots of sprinkles and, of course, a rum infused frosting! I used some shortcuts for this recipe, because, you know me, I like to keep my recipes simple and easy. In just a few steps you can enjoy some spirited Mardi Gras Cookies of your own.
Also, if you haven’t seen already, I visited New Orleans a few months back and absolutely fell in love with the city. I have a full travel guide of sorts, which you can see here. It rounds up some of the best foods, bars and things to do in the French Quarter and beyond. Anyway, back to the recipe!
How to Make Easy Mardi Gras Sugar Cookies Recipe
I decided to use break and bake sugar cookies from the store. You could of course make your own here, but I wanted to take the shortcut. Bake them according to the package instructions and let them cool.
While the cookies are baking, it’s time to prepare your rum frosting. Mix 4 cups of powdered sugar with 1/2 cup (1 stick) of softened butter. I would recommend letting your butter sit out on the counter for 20 minutes or so before you start the recipe so it can really be softened. Mine was still pretty cool and it definitely made it harder to get a smooth frosting. Learn from my mistakes! ? You can use a hand mixer here on low – medium speed.
Next add 1 Tbsp vanilla and 2-4 Tbsp of your preferred rum. I used a clear Bacardi Silver rum. I had 4 Tbsp of rum prepared to mix in the frosting and as I poured it I realized just how much that was! I think I ended up using about 3 Tbsp but it’s really up to you how much rum flavor you’d like. Mine was quite strong, but since it’s for Mardi Gras I’d say that’s appropriate. I’d recommend starting with 2 Tbsp and tasting the frosting before adding more.
How to Make this Mardi Gras Recipe Alcohol-Free
If you want an alcohol-free version you can sub in milk here or even do half and half if you want to keep the rum flavor lighter. Mix the liquid into the frosting with your hand mixer on medium-high speed until smooth.
Get your cooled cookies and start frosting! There is plenty of frosting to go around and I really loaded up my cookies. You could also cut the frosting recipe in half if you only want a light frosting layer.
Then sprinkle with gold, green and purple sprinkles. You see these colors everywhere during Mardi Gras. They weren’t chosen arbitrarily. In fact, Rex, the King of Carnival, selected these colors in 1892, declaring purple for justice, green for faith and gold for power. (source)
Now it’s time to enjoy! Since the rum in this recipe is used in the frosting and not baked in the mix these are definitely for the 21 and up crowd only.
Ingredients
- Pillsbury Pre-Made Sugar Cookies 24 ct
- 1/2 C Softened Butter
- 4 C Powdered Sugar
- 1 T Vanilla Extract
- 2-4 T Bacardi Rum
- Green, Gold and Purple Sprinkls
Instructions
- Bake cookies according to the package and allow to cool.
- While cookies are baking, mix 1/2 C softened butter (one stick) with 4 C powdered sugar until combined. You can use a hand mixer here.
- Add 1 T vanilla extract and 2-4 T preferred silver rum and continue mixing until a smooth frosting forms.
- Ice the cooled cookies with the frosting and add sprinkles.
- Enjoy.
Have you ever been to Mardi Gras in New Orleans? Do you celebrate in another way? Whether it’s with Hurricanes or King Cake, let me know below!
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Recipe adapted from BettyCrocker.com
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