Introduction: Batteries Not Included - Mechanical Alien Cookies: Nostalgia With Every Bite.

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About: Hello reader. My name is Steve and I live in the south east of England, U.K, and I have been a hobbyist for as long as I can remember. I've been making & tinkering with things ever since I was a kid, and many …

Welcome reader to another of my 'make in a day' Instructables.

The Project:

This time we will be going to the kitchen to make some special occasion cookies. Kilowatt, Carmen, Wheems, Flotsam and Jetsam are the mechanical extraterrestrials (AKA 'The Fix-Its), from the 1987 movie 'Batteries Not Included' created by Steven Spielberg and directed by Matthew Robbins, and is about these small extraterrestrial living machines that save an apartment block under threat from property development. I was 14 at the time the movie came out and still have very fond memories of it and attempted to make some 'Fix-It' cookies a little while ago, and after refining my decorating techniques I decided to document my forth attempt and share it here in case you wanted to make your own, or just wanted to see the making process.

And everything about the cookies you see in the photos, are edible.

The Inspiration:

Apart from enjoying the movie and being a Sci-Fi fan, this was a practice batch before making more for a good friend of mine who loves everything alien and robotic, and at time of writing this, has an upcoming small birthday party. He also have a sweet tooth as well and figured making these for them would be something a little different that my friend and his family would enjoy. For this I will be making three full batches (15 cookies in total) so there's enough for all.

The Making:

Although the decorating of these cookies takes a little time and patience, the hardest part of this project is deciding whether to eat them or not because they look so darn cute, but I don't mind saying that they do taste really good. The cookies themselves are a simple butter cookie mix my mother taught me how to make some 40 odd years ago, with a little lemon juice added to cut through the richness and adds a little extra flavour. A couple of the 'Fix-It' cookies have a lemon buttercream center, but all of them have very good quality fondant for the decoration and details. "FONDANT on cookies?" some of you may be saying, and yes that's right as they work really well together, taste great, and in fact using fondant with cookies has been used more than you may think both in DIY and manufactured cookies/biscuits. As I mentioned at the start, I consider these as special occasion cookies because of the extra work involved, but it's so worth it.

So lets get to it.

Supplies

Ingredients:

For the Cookies:

  1. 50g caster sugar
  2. 100g butter (softened)
  3. 150g self-raising flour
  4. A few drops of lemon juice (about a teaspoon full and is optional if you don't like lemon). a few drops of vanilla extract is a good option too.

You will need to make two batches, using the above measurements per batch.

For the Buttercream:

  1. 25g softened butter
  2. 50g icing sugar/confection sugar
  3. Tiny drop of milk
  4. A few drops of lemon juice (add to taste, and again optional)

For the Decorating:

  1. Edible metallic paint pens
  2. 125g granulated sugar and around 40 to 50ml of water to make sugar glue
  3. 500g grey fondant (go for the best quality fondant you can get, or make your own)
  4. A pack of skittles sweets (for the eyes)

I initially tried white fondant but found the colours of the edible paint were a little too bright when applied and the grey toned down the colours a bit which looked better.

Equipment:

  1. Large mixing bowl to mix the cookie dough
  2. Small mixing bowl to mix the buttercream
  3. Sieve
  4. Baking tray
  5. Empty glass or cup
  6. Rolling pin
  7. Spatula
  8. Mixing spoon
  9. Knife
  10. Cutting board
  11. Kitchen scales
  12. Wire rack
  13. Dusting/basting brush
  14. Tooth picks or cotton buds (with both cotton ends cut off) for scoring details onto the fondant
  15. And empty shelf in your refrigerator
  16. An oven either regular or small sized. I used a Ninja worktop oven which worked great for these cookies.
  17. Reference material. I found some good quality colour images on this Valentine website, and on the IMDb site, both of which show good details and colours used on the alien props. I have also supplied some in the following steps.

Make Time:

  1. 10 minute prep time for baking
  2. About 45 mins bake time for two batches (batch one for large, and batch two for small cookies)
  3. 1 hour minimum cool down time (Best thing is to bake the cookies one evening, and decorate the following day).
  4. About 1 hour to chill fondant details in the fridge
  5. And around an hour and a half to 2 hours for fondant wrapping and detailing per cookie (the given time is dependent on your skill level for detailing)
  6. Just under 13 hours in total for all five cookies give or take (will become less the more you make them).

Step 1: Design Aspects:

These little Fix-It dudes have retractable legs in the movie so I decided to go 'all in' and add legs to these cookie ETs. So that meant making a temporary display stand from (more on this in the last step) as the legs would not support the weight of the cookies. You could always forgo making the legs which will save time, and also means you can stack up a load onto a plate or serving platter.

I mentioned in the Design step that I initially tried white fondant on my first two attempts at making these, but found that the colours of the edible paint were a little too bright when the paint dried. So I tried a grey coloured fondant and this toned down the colours enough to make the end result look much better.

The colours I used were...

Not that I do loads of cooking or baking, especially specialist design stuff like this, I have used fondant on cakes, either pre-made or made my own, but never used it on cookies until my first batch of these Fix-It ETs. Obviously working on a much smaller scale, it worked well, helped a lot with making design details, and the mix of cookie and fondant actually do taste really good. It may go without saying, but only use quality stuff where you can as the freshness, texture and taste will really stand out for the better.

The detailing really does need time a little time and patience, but it's really worth the effort. Using the reference photos and using tooth picks to score out the details, and getting the edible paint colours as close as possible to the movie props just takes the finished results to another level.

And as mentioned in the intro, everything about theses little Fix-It ETs are edible (I would have loved to add some LEDs, but these are cookies after all, not display pieces and that would defeat the purpose of being completely edible).

Step 2: Making the Cookies:

You'll Need:

  1. 50g caster sugar
  2. 100g butter (softened)
  3. 150g self-raising flour
  4. A small amount of lemon juice (about a teaspoon full)

How to Make It:

  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C /fan 170°C/ gas 4.
  2. Line the baking tray with grease proof paper, or lightly spread butter over the base of the tray.
  3. for each batch, measure the butter into a bowl and beat to soften.
  4. Gradually beat in the sugar and then the flour with a sieve. Bring the mixture together with your hands to form a dough. Add a a few drops of lemon juice. The dough should by fairly stiff yet pliable, but not so moist that it sticks to your hands or the bowl.
  5. Form the first batch of dough into four large balls about 7cm in diameter (two for the large 'Fix-Its' and two extra) and place spaced well apart on the prepared baking tray. Leave two of them on a ball shape, and slightly flatten the other two with a spatula.
  6. Bake in the preheated oven for 25–30 minutes, or until a very pale golden colour.
  7. Lift off the baking tray and leave to cool completely on a wire rack.
  8. Bake the second batch making the dough into six smaller dough balls about 4 to 5cm in diameter (four for the small 'Fix-its' and extras). Bake these smaller ones for around 20 mins or so or as above, a very pale golden colour. Leave two of them in a ball shape and slightly flatten the rest with the spatula.

For just the plain cookies or any left overs, you can sprinkle a little icing sugar over the tops with a sieve, and enjoy just as they are.

If you don't like lemon, you can leave it out of the mix as the cookies taste great and are very more'ish without the lemon juice.

NOTE: If the cookies are a little soft when you remove them from the oven, they will still technically be cooking from the residual heat while they start to cool sitting on the wire rack, so the cookies will become firmer and go a slightly deeper golden colour as they cool.

Step 3: Making the Buttercream:

You'll Need:

  1. 25g softened butter
  2. 50g icing sugar
  3. Tiny drop of milk

How to Make It:

  1. To make the buttercream, in a small bowl (as we won't need a lot) whisk 25g of softened butter until super soft then add 50g of icing sugar, and a pinch of salt.
  2. Whisk together until smooth (start off slowly to avoid an icing sugar cloud), then beat in a small drop of milk.

Step 4: How to Make the Sugar Glue:

You’ll Need:

  1. 125g granulated sugar
  2. Around 40 to 50ml of water
  3. A small saucepan
  4. Optional: a larger saucepan with hot water to keep your mixture warm and usable

How to Make It:

  1. Add the sugar and water to your small saucepan and heat gently on a low–medium setting. Keep it moving with a stir until it melts down and turns into a thick, sticky syrup with a light golden glow.
  2. Once it’s reached that syrupy stage, take it off the heat. If you’d like it to stay warm and workable for longer, pour the sugar glue into a bowl then put it into a bigger one that’s filled with hot water from a kettle.
  3. Carefully dip the edges of the items you want to stick together into the syrup or use a small brush. A word of caution: molten sugar is rather fond of burning human skin, so do treat it with respect.
  4. Press the pieces together for a few seconds. It sets faster than you’d expect, so a brief hold should do the job nicely.

Step 5: Cookie One - Carmen, Part 1:

With the cookies made, now comes the detailing work to turn them from plain ol' cookies to something special. The techniques are all basically the same for each cookie ET, but there are some differences, so each cookie has its own step below. This is where you will also need the reference material for the detailing and colours. To make it easier to follow, I have broken this step down into two parts as a lot of this will carry over to the other cookies.

  1. Sprinkle some icing sugar/confectionary sugar over a chopping board. This will stop the fondant from sticking.
  2. Grab about 100g of fondant, and start working it in your hands by squeezing, folding, and rolling it so it becomes soft and pliable The more you work it, the more heat from your hands will warm it up to make it workable.
  3. Roll it into a ball, squash it down onto the chopping board and flatten it into a disc shape with the rolling pin. You want to make it about 1 -1.5mm thick or so.
  4. Lift up one of the large cookies , place the fondant on top and wrap it round so the cookie is completely covered.
  5. Cut off any excess fondant then using a combination of your fingers/thumbs and a knife, smooth the fondant joins over so it becomes seamless as much as possible. You can use a little water to help, but only use the tinniest amount or the fondant will become sticky.
  6. Roll out a small amount of fondant and cut into a disk, then place it on top of the cookie. Use a small dab of water to help the two fondant surfaces bond.
  7. Start of doing the detailing with a toothpick and the cotton bud (with the cotton ends cut off). To make the lines, use the toothpick by laying onto the fondant and gently press it down with a rocking motion for the larger lines or recesses, and for smaller and shallower details, carefully use the pick like a pen. Don't go too hard or you will rip the fondant. If the fondant does rip, smooth it back over with your finger. The cotton bud helps with larger detailing, recesses, indents and smoothing out tiny areas. Add a tiny sprinkle of icing sugar if the fondant starts to stick to the tools. Take you time with this as there is no rush.
  8. When the main detailing is finished, brush off any icing sugar left on the fondant.
  9. To make the little greebles (tiny detail parts), roll little pieces of fondant and form them into shape with a combination of your fingers and tools.
  10. Attach them to the cookie using a small dab of sugar glue.

If you make any mistakes with the detailing, you can always smooth it back over and start again. As I mentioned in the intro, this batch is my fourth attempt, and my first batch came out looking a bit rough and ready... but they tasted great none the less.

Step 6: Cookie One - Carmen, Part 2:

With the main detailing finished, we can move on to make the eyes and colour the fondant covering.

  1. Open up your pack of Skittles and take out two purple ones. Because Skittles don't do blue ones (in the U.K at least), I used the blue edible paint pens to colour them blue.
  2. Roll up two tiny pieces of fondant into balls and flatten them out to make the eye lids.
  3. Sandwich the sweet in between the eye lids, and squeeze the sides and back of the fondant together.
  4. For the eye sockets, cut a couple of small slits where the eyes will go, lift the top and bottom of the cookie fondant and insert the eyes. Brush in a tiny amount of sugar glue to help attach the eyes to the eye sockets. I used a toothpick for this as only a tiny amount of glue is needed
  5. Double check any of the detailing just incase any got deformed while fitting the eyes, and make the necessary fixes.
  6. Now we can start to colour in. I used a rose gold and light gold paint pens for Carmen, not an exact match, but pretty close. Use the reference pictures to see where to colour in with what colour.
  7. When the colouring in is finished, put the cookie to one side as we are done for now.

As I mentioned, the edible paint pens I used (which don't really taste of anything, which is actually a good thing), came in a metallic finish which helped give the ETs a metal finish look, but the colours I had were not exactly a matching shade, but the end result looked pretty good comparing them to the reference pictures I had.

So with Carmen pretty much done for now, we can move on to the others. The next steps are much shorter that Carmen because they are all made in pretty much the same way, but each with small differences.

Step 7: Cookie Two - Kilowatt:

Kilowatt is a bit flatter than Carmen, but has a more curved under side so two cookies are used here.

  1. Work and roll out another 100g of fondant.
  2. Grab another large cookie for the upper body, and one of the smaller ones for the under side.
  3. Spread a dollop of buttercream on the bottom of the smaller cookie, and place the larger cookie on top.
  4. Wrap the cookie sandwich in the rolled out fondant and seal together.
  5. Cat a small disk of fondant and place on top of the cookie.
  6. Referring to your reference pictures, make all of the detailing and gribbles and attach where needed.
  7. For the eyes, work a piece of fondant and mold/shape it into a rectangle block, roughly 8x2x2cm. Make the rough shape by hand, and use the side of a knife to dial the shape in a little more.
  8. Use the end of a pen or X-acto knife to make two eye sockets by pressing it into the fondant.
  9. Grab two yellow Skittles sweets, two balls of fondant flattened out and make the eyes the same way as Carmen, then attach the eyes to the sockets using some sugar glue.
  10. Attach the eye section to the bottom of the main body using some more sugar glue.
  11. Straighten up the sides of the eye panel with your fingers and the knife, and add the detailing with a toothpick and cotton bud.
  12. Use a toothpick to make some holes in the gribbles for the fondant antennas to be fitted later.
  13. Now we can finish off by colouring in. I used a metallic silver paint pen as Kilowatt is one colour.

Step 8: Cookie Three - Jetsam:

Now we can move onto the kids of the family, and we'll start with Jetsam which only uses one of the smaller cookies.

  1. With a sharp knife, cut a small section off the cookie for the eye section. Then eat the leftover piece, yum.
  2. Roll out a disk of fondant, this time only using about 70 to 80 grams, then cover the cookie and smooth out the joins underneath.
  3. Make the detailing with toothpicks and cotton buds and a knife, and add the greebles where needed.
  4. Roll out a small disk of fondant and cut out some triangle shapes, one large and two smaller ones.. Attach to the top of the cookie, using a dab of water to help them bond.
  5. Brush off any icing sugar remaining on the fondant.
  6. With two yellow Skittle sweets, wrap them in fondant eyelids as before, add a little sugar glue to the backs, and press into the recessed are we cut out earlier.
  7. Double check and fix any detailing on the body and around the eyes where needed.
  8. For the colouring in, I use a light gold and a darker gold.

Step 9: Cookie Four - Wheems:

Now for the baby of the bunch, Wheems, less detailing here, but more colours as its a patchwork ET (as you will know why, if you have seen the movie). This again only use one small cookie.

  1. Roll out and wrap fondant around the cookie.
  2. Add the detailing with a toothpick, knife and cotton bud. To get it as close to the movie prop, take extra close notice of reference pictures as the different panels will be different colours. The same goes for the greebles too.
  3. Use a toothpick and poke some holes into the cookie for the fondant antennas to be added towards the end.
  4. Here, as before, I used the dusting/basting brush to wipe off any excess icing sugar, but I went a little hard and the bristles left some little marks which looked interesting. So I ended up doing a swirl pattern by twisting the brush round and around which made some great little circular patterns which I liked. A happy accident that made for easy to do pattern details.
  5. The eyes, this time using two green Skittle sweets where done in the same way as Jetsam, with fondant eyelids and glued/pressed into place into the cookie front.
  6. Do a final tidy up of the detailing and you're ready to colour in.
  7. Do the best you can to match up the colouring for the different panels from the reference pictures. The colours I used were white, dark grey, black, light gold and a darker gold.

Four down, one to go...

Step 10: Cookie Five - Flotsam:

Flotsam is a little different from the other two kids, as this one uses two small cookies and buttercream.

  1. Grab the two small cookies and spread a dollop of buttercream to the bottom of one, and join the two together.
  2. Work and roll out about 500g of fondant into a disc, and another disc of about 300g.
  3. Cover the top half of the cookie, leaving the sides drooping down.
  4. Cut a small disc of fondant, about 4cm diameter, and attach to the top of the cookie.
  5. Hold the cookie upside down and attach the other disc of fondant, joining the edges of the two fondant discs together. Straighten up the over having fondant and try to guide it out so it flares out around the edges.
  6. Use a toothpick, cotton bud, knife, you fingers and the brush to add the detailing. The toothpick was the most used here as the detailing is subtle.
  7. Add and greebles and shape them with the toothpick, making the antenna holes as before.
  8. Much like Kilowatt, the eye section is made from a tiny block of fondant to make an eye panel. Use two red skittle sweets for the eyes, but this time there are no fondant eyelids.
  9. Because Flotsams eyes protrude out a little, I took the extra time to properly shape the eye panel, giving it a nice curved shape. The panel was attached with sugar glue and a final shaping and smoothing out of the eye panel was done.
  10. After a final detailing check and fix was done, the colour of edible paint pens I used were blue and a light gold.

When the colouring is done, the little guy can join the rest of the family waiting for their finishing touches.

Step 11: Detail Pieces:

Here we will make the legs for the kids and the antennas for all.

  1. Spread a little butter on a small plate, cut out a disc of greaseproof paper and stick it on the plate. The butter will hold the paper and stop it curling up.
  2. Sprinkle a little icing sugar onto the chopping board, pull off small pieces of fondant and roll then into thin strands, about 1.5mm thick (any thinner and they won't hold their shape).
  3. Carefully transfer them over to the plate, rolling them onto the side of a knife.
  4. To make the legs/feet, work small pieces of fondant then shape them into the correct shapes using your thumbs/fingers and the side of a knife.
  5. Join the pieces together, add any detailing with a toothpick, and carefully transfer them over onto the plate, again using the side if a knife helps here.
  6. Now transfer the cookies and the the pieces we just made into the fridge for at least an hour. This will help to set the fondant and keep all of the detailing.

Step 12: Final Step: Finishing Touches & Display Stand:

And we are almost done. Here we will make a simple foam core display stand, and attach the legs and antenna.

  1. To make the stand, there are a number of ways it can be done. I made mine using a sheet of A3 white 5mm foam core, cut out a base and made 5 stands. Three were narrow ones so the three kids can sit on then with the legs hanging either side. As the fondant legs won't be strong enough to hold any weight, they will sit slightly above the base of the stand. For the two adult ETs, I made two 'T' beams and a square that sits on top. All the pieces were glued with a hot glue gun.
  2. When cutting the foam core, use a fresh knife blade and use a metal edged ruler as a cutting guide. Don't attempt to make the cuts in one pass, instead make multiple light cuts.
  3. For the cookies, remove everything from the fridge, and warm up the sugar glue.
  4. Using a small brush, apply a little sugar glue to the bottom of the cookies and attach the legs. Hold in plate until the glue sets, which should only be a few seconds.
  5. When the legs are attached to one of the ET 'Fix Its', place them onto the stand. Then do the same for the rest of the kids.
  6. Carefully cut the antennas to size and remove from the plate, apply a little sugar glue to one end, and attach them to the cookies. Remember the little holes we made in the cookies and the attached gribbles, that's there we attach the antenna.
  7. Place the two adults onto their stands and attach their antenna.
  8. Finally, take some photos because these are cookies after all and they won't be around for long.

Top Tip:

If you intend to make these for someone and they need to travel, make a small travel kit of a brush, pre-mixed sugar glue which can be warmed up, and a sectioned container for the cookies and bits to travel in. Then heat the glue and fit the legs and antenna then place on the stand, on site.

And there we have it. Simple to bake cookies that taste great as they are, but with the added wow factor of something quite unique and will put a smile on anyone's face. Defiantly not your every day cookie because of the time and work involved, but for them special occasions... it is so worth it.

Thanks for reading, and happy making.