How to Make a Portuguese Tile Mosaic with Four Iced Cookies

Set four square cookies on a platter and you have a little canvas for Portuguese tilework. Give each cookie its own blue-and-yellow motif so a guest can lift a whole tile from the mosaic.

Find your four tiles

Measure the flat top of your smallest cookie. Cut a square window in a piece of paper, leaving the opening a little smaller than that measurement. Hold the window above the printed sheet to find a flower or star that sits comfortably inside. If a whole tile won’t fit, frame just its centre. Use the same window for all four.

Let the icing draw the grout lines

Choose the Sugar/Icing version of the Portuguese tile pattern sheet for this project. With sharp, clean scissors, cut the four squares while the sheet is still on its backing. Leave a slim rim of white icing around each print when you place it. Side by side, those rims will look like grout.

Build the mosaic from opposite corners

Peel each square and ease it onto fresh buttercream from the centre out. If your cookies already have hardened royal icing, brush on a thin layer of piping gel first, as described in our icing-sheet instructions. Set the two darkest cookies in opposite corners of the platter, then fill the gaps with the lighter pair.

Try a quartet for coffee with a friend, or repeat the arrangement down a long platter for a larger gathering.