“A Baker’s Field Guide to Christmas Cookies” (The Harvard Common Press, 2003) has just about everything a holiday cookie baker needs in a kitchen resource. Author Dede Wilson (she of the seminal “Christmas Cooking for Dummies”) carefully organizes more than 75 you’ve-got-to-bake-these recipes, devoting facing pages to each cookie; on the left is a slightly larger than life-size color photo and a treasure trove of opinionated information, and the recipe follows on the right, sorted by five criteria: dough freezes well, cookies keep well, fun to make with kids, quick to make and sturdy enough to mail.

Wilson’s Snickerdoodles segment reads like this:

Type: Shaped cookie
Habitat: United States
Description: This is a deceptively simple sugar cookie recipe. The ingredients are quite basic - butter, sugar, cinnamon - but the result is more than a sum of its parts; these cookies come together just perfectly in terms of balancing ease of preparation, common ingredients, crunch and flavor. They are so simple, I didn’t think my kids would like them, but then one twin determined them to be his favorite cookie in the book.
Field notes: These hail from New England, with versions dating from the mid-to-late 1800s. The name’s origin, however, is a bit more elusive. Some food historians say it’s just a made-up nonsense word that seems to appeal to kids and adults alike.
Lifespan: 2 weeks at room temperature in airtight container.

What’s not to like? The recipes work like a dream (Wilson includes lots of first-hand-experience baking tips that are specific to particular cookies), and the assortment covers a vast amount of ground. Unlike a tome from Martha Stewart Inc., this one clocks in at a very affordable $17.95 (the spiral binding probably has something to do with that). The verdict? Buy it. It’s even cheaper on amazon.com, just $15.16.

Here’s an oldie-but-goodie cookie that I’ve made the Dede Wilson way at least a half-dozen times; it’s the best recipe I’ve encountered for this particularly popular cookie. The one thing that Wilson doesn’t improve upon? How to unwrap all those Hershey’s Kisses without going bonkers.

PEANUT BUTTER CHOCOLATE KISS COOKIES
Makes about 3 dozen cookies.
Note: This recipe must be prepared in advance. From “A Baker’s Field Guide to Christmas Cookies” by Dede Wilson.

1 1/4 c. flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 c. smooth, unsalted natural (not hydrogenated) peanut butter
1/2 c. granulated sugar, plus more for coating
1/2 c. firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 egg
34 milk chocolate kisses, such as Hershey’s Kisses, unwrapped

Directions
In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda and salt. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter and peanut butter until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add granulated sugar and brown sugar and beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add vanilla extract and mix until incorporated. Add egg and beat until smooth. Reduce speed to low and add about 1/3 of flour mixture and mix until just incorporated. Gradually add remaining flour, mixing until just blended. Scrape dough onto a large piece of plastic wrap. Use wrap to help shape into a large, flat disc, then cover completely with wrap. Refrigerate until dough is firm enough to roll into balls, at least 1 hour or overnight.
When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. Roll dough between your palms into 1 1/2-inch balls. Roll balls in granulated sugar to coat completely. Place balls 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets. Gently press down on dough, just enough so balls don’t roll off baking sheet. Bake about 18 minutes, until cookies are lightly golden brown on bottoms (peek to check). Remove from oven and quickly press a chocolate kiss into center of each cookie (they might crack, that’s OK) and return to oven for 1 minute. Remove from oven and cool on baking sheets for 2 minutes, then carefully transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool completely. Can store for up to 2 weeks at room temperature in an airtight container in a single layer.

Pastry chef Zoe Francois, in a 2000 Strib archive photo.

You may know Minneapolis pastry chef Zoe Francois from the classes she teaches at Cooks of Crocus Hill and the Chef’s Gallery, or you may remember her exceptional work at the Local and Backstage @ Bravo, or you may recognize her from her don’t-miss blog, zoebakes.com, which, by the way, includes some awesome holiday cookie recipes.

Or, if you’re a bread baker, you probably know her name from her 2007 best-selling cookbook, “Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day” (Thomas Dunne Books, $27.95), which she co-wrote with Jeff Hertzberg. If you’re looking for a holiday gift for the baker on your list, this is the title for you, and if you don’t have it in your kitchen library, then run out and pick up a copy for yourself. Right now. It will change the way you think about baking bread - fantastic, bakery-quality bread - at home. Here are her takes on . . .

Christmas baking: “When I was growing up I looked forward to Christmas morning at my Granny’s house. It seemed like magic how I’d go to bed at night and wake up with a stocking stuffed with goodies at the foot of my bed. Later I learned that this was her way of keeping us kids in bed for an extra hour. Smart lady! My Granny had rituals that she never strayed from and one of them was making Christmas cookies. I remember tins of them all over the house. On every table, in every room there would be a different kind of wonderful sweet. I would search all over for my favorite, the maple shortbread cookies that had a sticky caramel coconut topping and a rich buttery bottom. It always seemed to me there were less of these lying around than the others. It turns out they were my father’s favorite as well and he beat me to the tins. It never occurred to me, as a child, the immense amount of effort my Granny went through to produce a dozen different Christmas cookies every year. All these years later, now that I make holiday cookies for my own family, I know it was a bit of magic and a whole lot of love that she used to create them, not to mention her precious time. This year she sent me several of those recipes, some of them on the original yellowed index cards from my great grandmother and great aunts. This year I intend to make every single one of them for my boys. It may take a while, not only because there are so many, but the instructions on some of the cards were minimal, proving it really was magic!

Sifting flour: “I hate to do [it] and will avoid it at great lengths. My Granny’s recipe calls for 1 1/4 cups sifted flour, which means you have to sift the flour over the measuring cup and once it is full sweep a knife over to level it off. This takes way too much time and is quite messy. I decided to weigh the flour and see if there was an easier way to get the same amount. It turns out that if I whisked the flour in my bin to aerate it, spooned it gently into my measuring cups and sweep a knife over it, I got exactly the same amount as I did when I sifted it. I was very pleased and intend to do this with most everything, except the most fragile cakes.”

A more recent photo of Zoe, in the familiar kitchen at Cooks of Crocus Hill in Edina.

MAPLE BROWN BUTTER SHORTBREAD COOKIES
Makes about 3 dozen.
Note: From Zoe Francois.

1/2 c. (1 stick) salted butter
1/4 c. sugar
1 1/4 c. sifted flour (see comment above)
2/3 c. maple syrup
1/4 tsp. salt
1 1/3 c. flaked coconut
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 tbsp. dried cranberries or cherries, very finely chopped (optional)
2 tbsp. candied fruit, very finely chopped (optional)

Directions
To prepare brown butter shortbread: Prepare a 9″ square baking dish with parchment paper (or use a rectangular tart pan with a false bottom). In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt butter until it boils and turns a light golden color, about 3 to 5 minutes. Remove from heat and drain butter into a medium bowl. Add sugar and flour to butter and mix with a spoon until well incorporated (dough will be quite loose). Cover and refrigerate dough for about 10 minutes; if dough gets too cold, just let it sit out until it is soft and pliable again.
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Put dough into prepared pan and distribute it evenly (cover dough in plastic wrap so you can easily spread with your fingers without the dough sticking to you). Bake on a cookie sheet for 20 minutes, or until dough is a nice golden brown. Remove and allow crust to cool on a rack while you make the maple-coconut filling.
To prepare maple-coconut filling: In a saucepan over medium heat, combine maple syrup, salt, coconut and vanilla extract and cook until mixture comes to a boil. Continue to cook for about a minute and add dried and candied fruits (optional). Pour maple-coconut mixture over cooled crust. Bake at 375° for about 15 to 20 minutes, until the coconut turns golden brown. Remove from oven to a wire rack to cool completely (If you are using the 9″ pan with parchment, you will need to cut around the edges with a knife to loosen cookies from pan). Invert cookies onto a cutting board (and peel off parchment paper, if using). Cut into rectangular bars, or little squares if you want them to last a few extra minutes.

This might be one of the easiest-to-make cookies to come out of our annual holiday cookie contest. It’s from Marsha Morrissette of Eden Prairie, and it was a finalist in our very first competition in 2003. Along with convenience, there’s another reason why you should bake them: They’re terrific.

Here’s what we wrote at the time:

Even though the recipe didn’t originate with her, everyone who knows Marsha Morrissette knows that Swedish Shortbread Cookies are synonymous with her and the yuletide season. “It’s the only Christmas cookie I make,” Morrissette said. “Everyone loves them, so why make anything else?”

The Eden Prairie resident first encountered the buttery treat 14 years ago at a cookie exchange, and it was love at first almond-and-raspberry bite. Her friend graciously shared the recipe, and a Morrissette family holiday tradition - and a contest finalist - was born. Over the years, Morrissette learned to make the simple beauties no earlier than a week in advance. Not for freshness reasons, but because they have a tendency to disappear. Even when they’re stashed out of sight. “They’re even good when you steal them straight out of the freezer,” she said. “No defrosting necessary.”

Marsha Morrissette, one of our 2003 cookie contest finalists. She’s in the vast Christmas ornament department at the General Store of Minnetonka.

SWEDISH SHORTBREAD COOKIES
Makes about 3 dozen.
Note: This recipe must be prepared in advance. From Marsha Morrissette of Eden Prairie. “Year after year I noticed that the Swedish Shortbread Cookies were always the first to disappear, and only then did our guests politely eat the others,” Morrissette wrote. “I finally decided, `Why even make anything but Swedish Shortbread?’ so that’s what I do.”

1 c. (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 c. plus 2 tbsp. granulated sugar
2 to 2 1/3 c. flour
1/3 c. raspberry jam
1 c. powdered sugar
1 tsp. almond extract
2 to 3 tsp. water

Directions
To prepare cookies: In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter and granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Reduce speed to low and slowly add flour, adding enough so dough isn’t sticky. Divide dough into six balls and refrigerate 30 minutes.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place a dough ball between 2 sheets of parchment paper and roll to 1/4-inch thickness, forming a 3- by 10-inch rectangle. Carefully peel away top layer of parchment paper. Make a shallow crease down long center of rectangle and fill crease with raspberry jam. Repeat with remaining dough and jam. Bake 10 to 12 minutes until edges become golden brown. Remove from oven, cool slightly and cut across short side of rectangle at a slight angle, making 6 or so cookies. Remove to a wire rack and cool completely.
To prepare icing: In a small bowl, whisk together powdered sugar, almond extract and water until smooth, then drizzle glaze across cookies.

What’s your favorite easy-to-make cookie?

The following is from Al Sicherman’s seminal “Caramel Knowledge,” his 1982 collection of columns (and recipes) from the Minneapolis Star and Tribune, now known as the Star Tribune. Alas, it’s no longer available in bookstores, but it turns up at the occasional garage sale (although I have a hard time imagine anyone parting with it), and a quick scan on Amazon reveals more than 25 used copies for sale, ranging in price from 39 cents to $35.98. Too bad Al doesn’t get a royalty on the latter.

Al Sicherman, in a photo taken just before his 2007 retirement. What else would he bake for his send-off, but chocolate?

Anyway, these cookies caught my attention. They’re very Al Sicherman - in that they turn a familiar supermarket item into something homemade - and they sound delicious.

FIG NEWTONS
Makes about 3 dozen cookies.
Note: This recipe must be prepared in advance. From “Caramel Knowledge” (Pants Press, $8.95). “Immediate apologies are due Nabisco,” writes Sicherman, “as Fig Newton is that company’s trademark for a fig bar cookie. I’m sorry. It just wouldn’t have worked to write, ‘For a message of gravity, send a Fig Bar Cookie.’”

3 c. sifted flour, plus extra for rolling dough
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 c. (1 stick) plus 3 tbsp. butter, at room temperature
1 c. packed brown sugar
2 egg whites
1 tsp. vanilla extract
About 1 lb. dried figs
1 c. water
2 tbsp. granulated sugar
2 tbsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice

Directions
To prepare dough: In a medium bowl, whisk flour and salt together. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter and brown sugar until mixture is light and fluffy. Beat in egg whites and vanilla extract and mix until well-incorporated. Reduce speed to low and gradually add flour mixture; dough will be quite thick. Wrap dough in waxed paper and refrigerate at least two hours.
To prepare filling: Meanwhile, cut off stems and hard ends of figs, discarding stems and hard ends. Finely chop figs (you should have about 2 cups). In a food processor fitted with a metal blade (or in a blender), combine figs, water, granulated sugar and lemon juice and pulse to briefly break up figs even more (it’s OK to skip this step if you don’t have a food processor or a blender). Pour fig-water mixture into a medium saucepan over medium-high heat and bring mixture to a simmer, stirring constantly until it has thickened, 6 to 7 minutes. Remove from heat and cool mixture.
To prepare cookies: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. Cut a 2- by 3-inch rectangle from a piece of paper to use as a guide when cutting dough. Lightly flour a work surface and rolling pin. Break dough into six roughly equal pieces. Leave five in refrigerator until ready to roll. Roll dough into a rectangle about 1/4 inch thick. Using pre-cut paper guide, cut dough into 2- by 3-inch pieces, returning scraps to refrigerator. Drop a generous (but not heaping) teaspoon of filling into middle of each rectangle and spread it so that it forms a band about an inch wide, running across the rectangle the short way all the way to the edges (the filling should fill the middle 1/3 of the cookie). Using a metal spatula, lift one side of uncovered dough and fold it about 2/3 of way across filling. Then flip the cookie over onto the rest of the uncovered dough (the dough should overlap). Place cookies seam side down on prepared baking sheets and flatten them slightly with the back of a spatula. Repeat with remaining dough and filling, placing cookies about 1 inch apart (cookies don’t really spread, so you don’t need to leave much room). Bake about 12 minutes, until they are just slightly brown and seem to have a bit of firmness; they’ll firm up more as they cool. Remove from from oven and cool for 2 minutes before transferring cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.

My now-retired colleague Al Sicherman wrote this in 2002:

The rash of phone calls before Christmas last year requesting “that Snickers Bar Cookie recipe that was in the paper” was puzzling: Taste had offered no such recipe. Even ignoring the name and searching our files for cookies with ingredients that some callers remembered, I came up empty again.

Finally, somebody suggested that the recipe might actually have appeared in an ad. After some digging I turned it up in a Snickers ad in one of those coupon inserts in the Sunday paper. I passed the recipe along to the callers, but locating it had answered only the question of where it had appeared. The other
question was why so many people wanted to try it.

Part of that answer surely is that Snickers is the best-selling candy bar in the country (and maybe in the world), and if that many people like Snickers bars it makes sense that many would like Snickers cookies. The other part, I’m guessing, is the surprise-in-the-middle aspect.

The demand for the recipe couldn’t have been fueled by how good the cookies are, because the people who wanted the recipe after they saw it in the paper (and then lost it) - couldn’t have tasted them yet.

It turns out that the cookies are really good (although if you hate Snickers bars you probably won’t like them). What the cookies aren’t is really lovely. In fact, they’re kind of blobby-looking - but you won’t get many complaints, because the blob is due entirely to the surprising (and slightly melty) chunk of Snickers bar in the middle.

The recipe suggested drizzling a glaze on the cookies, but frankly - between unwrapping all the Snickers and rolling all the cookies - I thought they were putzy enough, and glazing wouldn’t make them any prettier. But you might disagree.

SNICKERS BAR COOKIES
Makes about 60 cookies.
Note: The Snickers miniatures can be hard to find. They are really small. “Fun size” Snickers are about twice as big; substitute 30 of those (about 1 1/2 13.3-oz. bags), each cut in half. Or use 10 full-size (2.07-oz.) Snickers bars, each cut into 6 pieces.

For cookies:
3 c. flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 c. (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 c. creamy peanut butter
1 c. granulated sugar
1 c. (packed) brown sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract
60 Snickers miniatures (1 1/2 13-oz. bags), see Note
For glaze, optional:
1 c. sifted powdered sugar
2 tbsp. unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 tbsp. milk, or more as needed

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and baking soda and reserve. In a large mixing bowl, using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter, peanut butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla extract and beat until well-combined. Reduce speed to low, add flour mixture to peanut butter mixture and beat until just combined. For each cookie, shape about 1 1/2 tablespoons of dough into a 2 1/2-inch circle in one hand. Put a Snickers piece in the center, fold the dough up around it, then roll in your hands to form a ball completely enclosing the candy. (If candy peeks out, re-roll so it doesn’t.) Put the balls 4 inches apart on prepared baking sheets. Bake 10 to 12 minutes, until the cookies are lightly browned. Remove from oven and cool 5 minutes before transferring cookies to a wire rack to cool completely. If desired, prepare glaze by combining powdered sugar and cocoa powder in a medium bowl then whisking in milk until glaze is thin enough to drizzle, adding more milk if necessary. Drizzle over cooled cookies.

Do you have a candy bar-based cookie that you make?

The winner and five finalists of the sixth-annual Taste Holiday Cookie Contest were showing off their recipes at the Mill City Museum on Saturday. It’s an event that the museum very graciously hosts every year for our bakers, and for anyone who loves a good cookie (or five or six), it’s definitely a date to circle on your December calendar.

Contest winner Faith Ford of Big Lake.

The winning cookie, Double Chocolate-Cherry Espresso Drops. They were going fast.

Finalist Phyllis Kahn. She told me how she raises chickens and ducks at her Minneapolis home, for the freshest eggs possible. That’s a dedicated baker.

Finalist Margaret DeHarpporte of Eden Prairie.

Finalist Matt Boisen of Owatonna. The scent of his Cardamom Cookies filled the museum.

Finalist Mary Beth Conzett of Plymouth. She found her recipe for Ricotta Cheese Cookies in a special edition of Good Housekeeping magazine from the late 1990s. She still has the magazine, and brought it to the museum.

Finalist Sharon Severson of North Oaks.

Another shot of winner Faith Ford. There’s a reason I’m not a photographer, and my apologies to everyone for the lousy photos.

Perhaps a more accurate name for the Molasses Crinkles from the previous post would be “Lutheran Molasses Crinkles,” given their somewhat tame molasses-ginger bite. Not to malign the Lutheran Church in any way, mind you; it’s just that its members have - or at least had - a reputation for favoring bland everything.

I should know, I was raised Lutheran, and I lived it first-hand. To this day, I’m sure my mother couldn’t identify a garlic bulb to save her 401(k). I remember my aunt the PW (pastor’s wife, as in member of the Lutheran clergy) once jokingly described the recipe for Lutheran coffee, which went something like this: Pour warm water into a coffee cup. Dip a brown crayon into water until it turns slightly brown. Remove crayon, add 3 tablespoons of sugar and serve.

I digress. Several years ago I ran across the following un-Lutheran recipe (was it in Gourmet magazine? I can’t remember), a molasses-spice cookie that puts an emphasis on spice. Making it is as easy as making Mom’s version, but this one comes out darker (love that dark brown sugar and dark molasses), crispier and a whole lot feistier.

MOLASSES-SPICE COOKIES
Makes about 3 dozen.

2 1/4 c. flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2 tsp. ground cardamom
1 1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/4 tsp. ground allspice
1/4 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
1/4 tsp. salt
12 tbsp. (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/3 c. dark brown sugar
1/2 c. plus 1/3 c. granulated sugar, plus extra for rolling dough
1 egg yolk
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 c. dark molasses

Directions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, cardamom, ginger, cloves, allspice, black pepper and salt and reserve. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar until creamy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to medium, add egg yolk and vanilla extract and beat 30 seconds. Reduce speed to medium-low, add molasses and beat 5 minutes, stopping once to scrape down bowl. Reduce speed to low, add flour mixture and mix until just incorporated. Form dough into 1 1/2-inch balls, roll balls in sugar and place 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets. Bake until cookies are browned and slightly puffy, about 11 minutes. Remove from oven and cool 2 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Food memories are particularly potent around the holidays, don’t you think?

When I was a kid, my mother maintained what I considered to be a fantastic repertoire of cookies and bars. They were recipes that Mom pretty much limited to Christmas, which made me look forward to them all the more. Every December, our brown-and-pink kitchen on Grimes Avenue would be enveloped with the scent of pumpkin bars, toffee bars, spritz, Russian tea cakes, salted peanut cookies and more.

Mom’s Molasses Crinkles. They may not be the world’s sexiest cookie, but they’re soft and chewy and have a tasty ginger bite. They’re also a snap to make.

Mom doesn’t bake much these days (”It’s a good thing that there are bakeries,” she said with a laugh), but she’s kept her felt-covered booklet of recipes, about 50 or so 5-by-7 cards that are bound together by two large metal rings. I’m not exactly sure about this, but I think that my sister Cheri made it in home-ec at Brooklyn Junior High in Brooklyn Park. It was a project in the same sewing class where she received a D+ on her report card, with “working to ability” written in next to the grade. Poor Cheri. That happened nearly 40 years ago, and we’re still giving her a hard time about it.

So I called Mom yesterday and asked if she could unearth a few of her Christmas Cookie Greatest Hits, and she graciously obliged. Just hearing her read the ingredients and instructions to me over the telephone brought back such comforting memories.

My sisters and I, with a certain someone, just a few short decades ago. We’re probably thinking about cookies.

(If only she could find the recipe for the mint meringues that she would make especially for me; I never understood why no one else in my family liked them, but that’s OK, that only meant there were more for me to selfishly enjoy. Next time, I’m nailing down the recipe for “Grandma’s Ranger Cookies,” a specialty of my grandmother Hedvig’s. I always loved them. Who knows? Maybe Mom will produce a copy as a Christmas present.)

I can picture the big trays of cookies that would signal dessert - followed by the unwrapping of presents - at our annual Christmas parties: Dad’s family on Christmas Eve, Mom’s on Christmas night. There are plenty of talented bakers in my family (my late aunt Millie and her lefse - slathered in butter, dusted with sugar and rolled like cigars - my aunt Marge and her wonderful banana bread and my late great-aunt Marian and her awesome krumkake, to name a few), but despite the enormous assortment, I almost always gravitated to my mom’s familiar sweets. Not just because they tasted great, but also because, on some level, the holidays are about liking what you like. Tradition, right?

Here are two of Mom’s oldies-but-goodies. They probably originated from a Betty Crocker cookbook or the back of a package. I can practically taste them now.

MOLASSES CRINKLES
Makes about 3 dozen.
Note: From Judy Nelson of Eagan. This recipe calls for shortening, an ingredient I try to avoid, partly because it’s made with hydrogenated fat - which doesn’t do our dietary health any favors - and partly because butter just tastes better. If you substitute butter for shortening, the cookies’ texture will change (butter has more moisture than shortening, which will result in a crisper, flatter cookie). So here’s a trick: Add an egg yolk when you incorporate the egg into the cookie dough. The additional yolk will help restore a bit of the cookies’ cake-like texture.

2 1/4 c. flour
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1 tsp. ground ginger
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 c. light brown sugar
3/4 c. shortening
4 tbsp. molasses
1 egg
Granulated sugar for rolling cookies

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, salt, baking soda, cloves, ginger and cinnamon and reserve. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat brown sugar and shortening until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add molasses and mix until thoroughly combined. Add egg and mix until thoroughly combined. Reduce speed to low, add flour mixture and mix until just combined. Roll teaspoon size balls of dough in granulated sugar and place dough 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets. Using a wet thumb, lightly press down on dough to slightly level off the top. Bake 10 minutes, until cookies are nicely cracked on top. Remove from oven and cool 2 minutes before transferring cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.

TWO-LAYER BROWNIES
Makes 1 8×8-inch pan.
Note: From Judy Nelson. Mom couldn’t find the recipe for the icing (”I think I used butter and powdered sugar and cocoa, but I can’t remember,” she said). I mentioned that I thought she relied upon the recipe on the back of the Hershey’s cocoa tin, and that seemed to ring a bell, so that’s the formula I’m including here. The icing recipe always made more than the brownies required, so Mom would liberally spread the leftovers on graham crackers, which my siblings and I considered to be an extra-special treat.

For brownies:
1/2 c. unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus extra for pan
1 c. sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 c. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
2 oz. unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled
For icing:
1/2 c. (1 stick) unsalted butter
2/3 c. cocoa
3 c. powdered sugar
1/3 c. milk
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions
To make brownies: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease bottom and sides of an 8×8-inch pan. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter and sugar until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla extract and beat until thoroughly combined. Reduce speed to low, add flour and salt and mix until just combined. Divide dough in half. Add chocolate to one half, stirring until well-combined. Spread chocolate batter into pan and even top with a spatula. Carefully spread second half of batter over chocolate batter. Bake 30 minutes. Remove from oven to a wire rack and cool completely.
To make icing: In a microwave oven or using a double boiler, melt butter. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat butter and cocoa until well-blended. Reduce speed to low and add powdered sugar and milk in 3 batches, beginning and ending with powdered sugar, beating to spreading consistency (add additional milk, 1 teaspoon at a time, if necessary). Add vanilla extract and mix until well-blended. Spread icing over cooled brownies.

What’s a cookie memory from your childhood kitchen?

Check out this video at startribune.com, where I toss out a few cooking-baking tips while making the “Neiman Marcus Chocolate Chip Cookies.” (The recipe of which is just a few posts down). See how easy it is?

Each Thursday in December we’ll be profiling a different cookie cookbook. This week it’s “Field Guide to Cookies” by Anita Chu.

The book’s subtitle says it all: “How to identify and bake virtually every cookie imaginable.” That might be a little bit of a stretch; after all, the book contains only about 100 recipes. That’s a big “only,” though, because a hundred is still a heck of a lot, especially in a book that’s smaller than most romance novels. That handy size makes it easy to toss in a drawer, ready on a moment’s notice when the cookie-baking mood strikes. Its diminuitive size also has plenty of stocking-stuffer potential.

All 100 cookies are photographed and filed in a single section, designed so readers can quickly flip through and spy a tempting-looking treat. While they’re aren’t a lot of surprises - which makes this a great resource for beginning bakers - the recipes are easy to follow and clearly written, and Chu includes plenty of helpful tips. Another bonus is the brief but fascinating cookie history that precedes each recipe. The selection covers a lot of baking bases: there are drop cookies, bar cookies, sandwich cookies, cutout cookies, decorated cookies, the works. Here’s another reason to buy: it’s $15.95.

Here’s a recipe that immediately caught my eye:

PECAN SANDIES
Makes 2 to 3 dozen cookies.
Note: This recipe must be prepared in advance. From “The Field Guide to Cookies” by Anita Chu (Quirk Books, $15.95).

1 1/2 c. pecans, toasted
1/3 c. powdered sugar
1/3 c. light brown sugar
1 1/2 c. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 c. plus 2 tbsp. (1 3/4 sticks) cold unsalted butter
1 egg
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
About 30 pecan halves for decoration

Directions
In a food processor fitted with a metal blade, combine pecans, powdered sugar and brown sugar and pulse until pecans are finely ground. Add flour and salt and pulse until well-combined. Cut butter into small pieces, scatter butter over pecan-flour mixture and pulse until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add egg and vanilla extract and pulse until dough comes together. Turn dough out onto a piece of parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. Roll out to 1/4 inch thickness (sprinkle dough and rolling pin with a little flour if dough is too sticky). Wrap dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for about 1 hour or until firm. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. Using a 2-inch cookie cutter, cut out cookies from chilled dough. Transfer dough to baking sheets, spacing cookies 2 inches apart. Place a pecan half in center of each cookie. Bake 18 to 20 minutes or until edges of cookies turn golden brown, rotating cookie sheets halfway through baking. Remove from oven, cool for 2 minutes then transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool completely. Cookies can be stored in an airtight container for up to 1 week.

Are you baking out of this book? What’s your review?