Modern Wife

Tag: cookies

  • Date Balls

    Date Balls

    Last Christmas, while gathered around the dinner table at Aunt Faye’s, we got talking about Mammy Flanders’ Date Balls. My husband said it was one of his favorite snacks Mammy made. Aunt Faye didn’t like it much, so it was always missing from her dessert spread during the holidays. My husband wanted to have a taste of them again.

    Aunt Faye brought out (gasp) Mammy Flanders’ recipe box, filled with handwritten recipes from several generations back.

    “Here,” she said. “You can take that home and go through it. It’s gotta be in there somewhere.”

    The cousins all looked longingly at Mammy Flanders’ recipe box. I myself was astounded at how easily it was to pry that heirloom recipe box from Aunt Faye’s hands, but she must have known it was in good hands. My husband felt a responsibility to give back to the family, so he transcribed Mammy’s recipes and posted it as an ebook for everyone to enjoy.

    Since then we’ve been going through the recipes one by one and trying them out. Give this one a try.

    Date Balls

    Ingredients:
    1/4 cup butter
    1 cup sugar
    2 eggs
    1 teaspoon vanilla
    ¼ teaspoon salt
    1 ½ cup ground dates
    3 cups rice crispies

    Cook all ingredients except rice crispies in frying pan over high heat for 10 minutes, stirring constantly to keep from burning. Remove from heat, then add the rice crispies and mix well. Once cool enough to touch, form into tight balls and roll in shredded coconut.

    Enjoy!

  • Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

    Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

    Oatmeal Raisin Cookies have to be one of the easiest cookies to make. Everybody knows how to make that! That’s what I thought until I baked some.

    I got the recipe off the top of the Quaker Oats container. They call it the Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. Here’s my version:

    Ingredients:
    1 cup (2 sticks) organic butter, softened
    1 cup organic brown sugar
    1/2 cup organic sugar
    2 eggs, organic
    1 teaspoon organic vanilla
    1 1/2 cups organic all-purpose flour
    1 teaspoon baking soda
    1 teaspoon organic cinnamon powder
    1/2 teaspoon salt
    3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
    1 cup organic raisins

    Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

    Cream together the butter and sugars. Whisk in eggs and vanilla. Put the whisk away. Add flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Using a spatula, mix the dry ingredients into the batter. Add oats and raisins. It will get very thick. Mix really well.

    Butter a baking sheet with wax paper covers, then spoon rounds of cookie dough about a couple of inches apart from each other.

    Now here was the tricky part for me. I baked the cookies too long and wound up with hard cookies. Bake it for 12 minutes. That’s it. (It might be even shorter if you live in a high altitude location.)

    Get the babies out of the oven and let them cool off on wire racks.

    Everybody loves these Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. Those people at Quaker Oats were right. These cookies quickly vanish. I have to make more!

  • Gingerbread Cookies

    Gingerbread Cookies

    It’s the afternoon before Christmas Eve, and my 8-year-old daughter is itching for something to do. Presents are wrapped. Too early for a movie. We turn into Cookie Monsters and bake up a batch of Gingerbread Cookies!

    Gingerbread Cookies Ingredients

    Ingredients:
    3/4 cup (or 1 1/2 sticks) organic butter
    3/4 cups organic brown sugar
    1/2 cup molasses
    1 egg, organic and from free range chicken
    1 teaspoon vanilla
    3 cups organic all-purpose flour
    2 teaspoons ground ginger
    1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
    1 teaspoon baking soda
    1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
    1/4 teaspoon salt

    Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

    Beat butter and sugar together in a medium bowl until smooth. Add molasses, egg and vanilla. Whisk very well. It will take quite a bit of elbow grease to make it smooth, but carry on. It will be worth it.

    Add flour, ginger, cinnamon, baking soda, nutmeg and salt. Beat with spatula until well incorporated.

    On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough a little bit at a time to 1/4 inch thickness. Use cookie cutters to cut shapes. Lay an inch apart on baking sheet. (Since I don’t use non-stick cookware, I save the wax paper covers of butter in the freezer and rub my baking sheet with it when I’m baking.)

    Bake for 8 to 10 minutes or until cookies begin to brown. Cool on wire racks, then decorate.

    Here are some fun ideas for decorating your Gingerbread Creatures.

    Happy Holidays!

  • Butter Cookies

    Butter Cookies

    We have quite a collection of seasonal cookie cutters, and this is our go-to recipe for shaped Butter Cookies. We whip this out on Christmas, Easter or any old time we feel like it. I think we like playing with the rolling pin and cookie cutters more than eating the cookies!

    Ingredients:
    2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, unbleached
    1 teaspoon baking powder
    1/2 teaspoon salt
    3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, softened
    1 cups organic sugar
    2 large eggs, free range and organic
    1 3/4 teaspoons vanilla extract

    Beat butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Add vanilla and mix well.

    Add flour, baking powder and salt and mix in with the rest of the batter.

    Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Dust work surface with flour and sprinkle some of the remaining sugar on top of the flour. Using a floured rolling pin, roll one dough to 1/8 inch thickness. Cut out shapes with desired cookie cutters, re-rolling scraps for additional cutouts.

    Place cookies 2 inches apart on greased baking sheets and bake for 8 to 10 minutes.

    Decorate with cookie icing, if you want. Sprinkle with sugar. Or serve as is.

  • Poodle Turds

    Poodle Turds

    Okay, they’re not really poodle turds. This is my mother-in-law’s recipe for no-bake chocolate-oatmeal cookies. The lady had a sick sense of humor, and played many pranks in her day. A few years back she used to sell homemade Poodle Turds at PoodleTurds.com. My husband Photoshopped my smile on a poodle and Buttons, the smiling mascot was born, selling Poodle Turds like hotcakes.

    Ingredients:
    2 cups organic sugar
    1/2 cup raw milk
    1/2 teaspoon salt
    1/2 cup (1 stick) organic butter
    5 level tablespoons cocoa powder

    Combine the ingredients above in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Let it go to full boil for 2 minutes while stirring continuously.

    Remove from heat and quickly mix in:

    1 teaspoon vanilla
    3 cups instant oatmeal

    Scoop cookies onto wax paper and let it harden as it cools.

  • Pumpkin Cookies

    Pumpkin Cookies

    This recipe was passed on to us from my husband’s grandmother, who sent us care packages of her special Pumpkin Cookies every Halloween. Mammie used Crisco Oil and it made her cookies very moist and last for weeks. I used organic canola oil as a healthier alternative, and this makes the pumpkin cookies moist, light and fluffy. If you like your cookies crispy on the surface, use butter instead.

    pumpkin cookies

    Mammie’s Pumpkin Cookies

    Ingredients:
    2 cups sugar
    1 cup canola oil (or butter – 2 sticks)
    2 eggs
    2 teaspoons baking soda
    2 teaspoons baking powder
    1 teaspoon salt
    2 teaspoons cinnamon
    2 teaspoons vanilla
    2 tablespoons milk
    1 can pumpkin
    4 cups flour
    1 large bag semi-sweet chocolate chips

    Preheat oven 375 degrees F. Mix well all ingredients, except flour and chocolate chips. Add flour slowly until smooth. Add chocolate chips and mix. Spoon onto greased cookie sheet and bake for 12 to 15 minutes. Take the cookies out as soon as they are showing a bit of brown around the outer edges.