by Joanne Fluke
In a medium-sized mixing bowl, combine the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda. (I stir mine gently with a whisk so that everything’s mixed together.) Set the bowl aside.
Hannah’s 2nd Note: I used an electric mixer for this part of the recipe. You can do it by hand, but it takes some muscle.
Mix the softened butter and sugar together on HIGH speed until they’re light and fluffy.
Add the eggs and mix on MEDIUM speed until the mixture is a uniform color.
Take your bowl out of the mixer and blend in the raisins and the vanilla extract by hand.
Fold in the flour mixture carefully. The object is to keep the dough fluffy.
Put approximately ½ cup sugar into a small bowl. Drop the dough from a teaspoon (or Tablespoon if you want large cookies) into the bowl of sugar. Form the drops into balls with your fingers and move them to a lightly greased cookie sheet (I sprayed my cookie sheet with Pam), 12 cookies to a standard-sized sheet.
Bake the Raisin Drops at 350 degrees F. for 9 to 10 minutes, or until just lightly browned.
Lois Brown’s Note: I bake just a few at first to make sure there’s the right amount of flour. If they spread out too thin, add another Tablespoon or two of flour. I have been making this recipe for my family for 40 years.
Yield: 5 to 6 dozen deliciously soft raisin cookies.
* RASPBERRY VANILLA SWIRLS
DO NOT preheat oven — cookie dough must chill before baking.
1 cup white (granulated) sugar
1 cup (2 sticks, 8 ounces, ½ pound) salted butter, softened
1 large egg
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
2 and ½ cups all-purpose flour (scoop it up and level it off
with a table knife – don’t pack it down in the cup)
1 teaspoon raspberry extract
1 teaspoon red food coloring
1 Tablespoon seedless raspberry jam
cup (2 Tablespoons) all-purpose flour (that’s in addition
to the flour you added earlier)
powdered sugar for rolling out the dough
Hannah’s 1st Note: This is easy with an electric mixer, but you can also do it by hand.
Place the sugar in a large mixing bowl.
Add the softened butter and mix until it’s light and fluffy.
Add the egg and mix well.
Sprinkle in the salt and the baking powder. Mix until they’re thoroughly incorporated.
Add the vanilla extract. Mix it in well.
Add the flour by half-cup increments, mixing after each addition.
Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl and give the dough a final stir by hand.
Place a sheet of wax paper on the counter. Dust the wax paper with powdered sugar.
Remove HALF of the cookie dough from your mixing bowl and place it on the wax paper. Pat it out like pie crust with your impeccably clean hands and then dust the top with more powdered sugar.
With a rolling pin, roll the dough into a rectangle that is approximately ¼ inch thick. Cover the dough with another sheet of wax paper and store it in the refrigerator.
Go back to the dough in the mixer. This will be the raspberry part of your cookie pinwheels.
Turn the mixer on LOW and add the raspberry extract and the red food coloring. If you bought it in one of those little squeeze bottles, you don’t have to measure out a teaspoonful. Just keep adding drops until you think it’s the right color for your pinwheels.
Heat the Tablespoon of seedless raspberry jam in the microwave for a few seconds until it reverts to a liquid. Then add it to your mixing bowl and mix it in.
You’ve added more liquid to your cookie dough, so now you must add a bit more flour. Sprinkle in the additional eighth cup of flour and mix well.
Tear off a sheet of wax paper and spread it out on the counter. Dust it with powdered sugar and roll out the pink half of your dough. Again, form a rectangle that is approximately ¼ inch thick.
Cover the raspberry half of your dough with another sheet of wax paper. Place it on top of your vanilla cookie dough in the refrigerator.
Chill both halves of your pinwheel cookie dough for at least 2 hours.
After your cookie dough has chilled for 2 hours, tear off another sheet of wax paper and spread it out on the counter. Dust it with powdered sugar. This will hold the cookie roll you’re about to make.
Grasping the raspberry dough by the corners of the wax paper, carefully slide it off the vanilla dough and place it to the side on the counter. Then peel the top sheet of wax paper off the vanilla dough, working slowly and carefully so that it doesn’t tear.
When the vanilla dough is bare on top, position the long end of the raspberry dough rectangle next to the long end of the vanilla dough rectangle. Peel the top layer of wax paper from your raspberry cookie dough.
Dust the bare top of your raspberry cookie dough with powdered sugar. Then cover it with the sheet of wax paper you tore off earlier. Grasping both sheets of wax paper, the one on the top and the one on the bottom, flip the raspberry dough over so that the side you dusted with powdered sugar is now on the bottom.
Hannah’s 2nd Note: Believe me, this is harder to explain than it is to do. I wish I could just come over to your kitchen and show you!
Peel off the top sheet of wax paper and slide the raspberry dough on top of the vanilla dough. Working carefully and loosening the wax paper as you go, push your raspberry cookie dough off the wax paper and onto the bare vanilla cookie dough.
If the edges of the dough are uneven, trim them with a sharp knife. Use the pieces of dough you’ve trimmed for patches if there are any holes.
Working from the long side of the rectangle, roll up the dough so that it forms a log. This will create a pinwheel later when you slice the log into cookies.
Roll your cookie log in a piece of wax paper, twist the ends to keep the roll from coming undone, and refrigerate it for another 2 hours. (Overnight is fine, too.)
Hannah’s 3rd Note: At this point, you can even freeze the dough log if you put it into a large freezer bag that’s airtight. Thaw it in the refrigerator 24 hours before you want to bake the cookies.
When 2 hours have passed, preheat your oven to 375 degrees F., rack in the middle position.
Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or spray it with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray.
If your cookie roll has flattened in the refrigerator, you can roll it a bit on the counter to round it out.
Using a sharp knife, cut ¼ inch slices from the cookie dough log. Cut only as many as you can bake at one time and return the log to the refrigerator between baking.
Place the Raspberry Vanilla Swirls on the cookie sheet, twelve to a standard-size sheet.
Bake at 375 degrees F. for 8 to 10 minutes.
Remove the cookies from the oven and cool them on the cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then remove them to a wire rack to cool completely.
Yield: 4 to 6 dozen pretty and tasty cookies that everyone will love.
RED VELVET COOKIES
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F., rack in the middle position.
2 one-ounce squares unsweetened baking chocolate
½ cup butter (1 stick, 4 ounces, ¼ pound) at room
temperature
cup brown sugar, firmly packed
cup white (granulated) sugar
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1 large egg
1 Tablespoon red food coloring
2 cups flour (pack it down in the cup when you measure it)
¾ cup sour cream
1 cup (6-ounce package) semi-sweet chocolate chips
Line your cookie sheets with parchment paper. Spray the parchment paper with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray. (If you don’t have parchment paper, you can use foil, but leave little “ears” of foil sticking up on the ends, enough to grab later when you slide the whole thing
on a wire rack to cool.)
Unwrap the squares of chocolate and break them apart. Put them in a small microwave-safe bowl. (I used an 8-ounce measuring cup.) Melt them for 90 seconds on HIGH. Stir them until they’re smooth and set them aside to cool while you mix up your cookie dough.
Hannah’s 1st Note: Mixing this dough is easier with an electric mixer. You can do it by hand, but it takes some muscle.
Combine the butter, brown sugar, and white sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer. Beat them on MEDIUM speed until they’re smooth. This should take less than a minute.
Add the baking soda and salt, and resume beating on MEDIUM speed for another minute, or until they’re incorporated.
Add the egg and beat on MEDIUM speed until the batter is smooth (an additional minute should do it.) Add the red food coloring and mix for about 30 seconds.
Shut off the mixer and scrape down the bowl. Then add the melted chocolate and mix again for another minute on medium speed.
Shut off the mixer and scrape down the bowl again. At LOW speed, mix in half of the flour. (That’s one cup.) When the flour is incorporated, mix in the sour cream.
Scrape down the bowl again and add the rest of the flour. (That’s the second cup.) Beat until the flour is fully incorporated.
Remove the bowl from the mixer and give it a good stir with a spoon. Mix in the chocolate chips by hand. (A firm rubber spatula works nicely.)
Use a teaspoon to spoon the dough onto the parchment-lined cookie sheets, 12 cookies to a standard-sized sheet. (If the dough is too sticky for you to work with, chill it for a half-hour or so, and try again.)
Bake the cookies at 375 degrees F., for 9 to 11 minutes, or until they rise and become firm. (Mine took exactly 9 minutes.)
Slide the parchment paper from the cookie sheets and onto a wire rack. Let the cookies cool on the rack while the next sheet of cookies is baking. When the next sheet of cookies is ready, pull the cooled cookies onto the counter or table, and slide the parchment paper with the hot cookies onto the rack. Keep alternating until all the dough has been baked.
When all the cookies are cool, peel them off the parchment paper and put them on wax paper for frosting.
CREAM CHEESE FROSTING:
¼ cup softened butter (½ stick, 2 ounces, pound)
4 ounces softened cream cheese (half of an 8-ounce package)
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups powdered (confectioner’s) sugar (no need to sift
unless it’s got big lumps and then you should open a
new package anyway)
Mix the softened butter with the softened cream cheese and the vanilla extract until the mixture is smooth.
Hannah’s 2nd Note: Do this next step at room temperature. If you heated the cream cheese or the butter to soften it, make sure it’s cooled down before you continue.
Add the confectioner’s sugar in half-cup increments until the frosting is of proper spreading consistency. (You’ll use all, or almost all, of the sugar.)
A batch of Red Velvet Cookies yields about 3 dozen, depending on cookie size. They’re soft, velvety, and chocolaty, and they’ll end up being everyone’s favorite cookie.
Hannah’s 3rd Note: If you really want to pull out all the stops, brush the tops of your baked cookies with melted raspberry jam, let it dry, and then frost them with the Cream Cheese Frosting.
REGENCY GINGER CRISPS
DO NOT preheat oven — dough must chill before baking.
¾ cup melted butter (1 and ½ sticks, 6 ounces)
1 cup brown sugar (pack it down when you measure it)
1 large beaten egg (or two medium, just whip them up with
a fork)
4 Tablespoons molasses (that’s 1/4 cup) 53
2 teaspoons baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground ginger
2 and ¼ cups flour (not sifted – pack it down when you
measure it)
½ cup white sugar in a small bowl (for coating the
dough balls)
Melt the butter and mix in the sugar. Let the mixture cool to room temperature.
Mix in the egg, molasses, baking soda, salt, and ground ginger. Stir it until everything is incorporated.
Add the flour in one-cup increments, mixing after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and give it a final stir.
Chill the dough for at least 1 hour. (Overnight is even better.)
When you’re ready to bake, preheat your oven to 375 degrees F., rack in the middle position.
Roll the dough into walnut-sized balls with your impeccably clean hands. Then roll the dough balls in the bowl of white sugar to coat them. Place them on greased cookie sheets (or cookie sheets you’ve sprayed with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray), 12 dough balls to a standard-sized sheet. Flatten the dough balls with the back of a metal spatula.
Bake the cookies at 375 degrees F. for 10 to 12 minutes or until the Regency Ginger Crisps are nicely browned.
Remove the cookies from the oven. Cool them on the cookie sheets for 2 minutes and then remove them to a wire rack to finish cooling.
Hannah’s 1st Note: If you leave these on the cookie sheets for too long, they’ll stick. One way to get around this problem is to line your cookie sheets with parchment paper and spray the paper with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray.
Yield: 5 to 6 dozen delightful cookies, depending on cookie size.
Hannah’s 2nd Note: I served these at Mother’s Regency Romance Club. They asked me for something from the Regency Period. Since they had all the ingredients back then, I figured why not?
SHORT STACK COOKIES
DO NOT preheat oven — dough must chill before baking.
1 and ½ cups melted butter (3 sticks, 12 ounces)
2 cups white (granulated) sugar
2 large eggs, beaten (just whip them with a fork)
½ cup maple syrup 54
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 cups all-purpose flour (pack the flour down in the cup
when you measure it)
½ cup white (granulated) sugar for coating the dough balls
Melt the butter and then mix in the sugar. Set the bowl aside on the counter to cool to room temperature.
Once the mixture is cool, add the beaten eggs. Mix everything thoroughly.
Mix in the maple syrup, baking soda, salt, and vanilla extract.
Add the flour in one-cup increments, mixing after each addition.
Chill the dough for at least 2 hours before baking. (Overnight is fine, too.)
When you’re ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F., rack in the middle position.
Place ½ cup white sugar in a shallow bowl. You’ll use this to coat your dough balls.
Roll the dough into walnut-sized balls with your impeccably clean hands.
Roll the dough balls in the bowl of sugar to coat them and then place them on greased cookie sheets, 12 cookies to a standard-sized sheet. (You can also use Pam or another nonstick cooking spray, or line the cookie sheets with parchment paper.)
Flatten the dough balls with the back of a metal spatula.
Bake the cookies at 350 degrees F. for 10 to 12 minutes or until they are nicely browned.
Take the cookies out of the oven. Cool them on the cookie sheets for 2 minutes, and then remove them to a rack to finish cooling. (If you leave them on the cookie sheets for too long, they’ll stick.)
Hannah’s Note: Edna Ferguson says these taste exactly like pancakes that are slathered with maple syrup and butter, and she wishes she could get away with serving them instead of real pancakes at the annual faculty breakfast.
SPICY DREAMS
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F., rack in the middle position.
Hannah’s 1st Note: This recipe is from Lindy Frank and I’m glad she finally sent it to me. Her cookies disappear faster than a Popsicle on a hot day. Lindy calls the
se cookies “Ginger Cookies,” but since we already serve a cookie by that name down at The Cookie Jar, we’ve renamed these “Spicy Dreams.”
Hannah’s 2nd Note: Lindy says to tell you that she makes these cookies festive by using colored sugar for holidays. She uses pink and red sugar for Valentine’s Day, orange sugar for Halloween, green sugar for St. Pat’s Day, red and green for Christmas, etc.
1 cup softened butter (2 sticks, 8 ounces, ½ pound)
1 pound and 6 ounces white (granulated) sugar (2 and cups)
3 eggs
1 cup molasses
2 Tablespoons vinegar (white will do just fine)
2 Tablespoons baking soda
4 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground cardamom
1 pound and 12 ounces all-purpose flour (6 cups – pack it
down in the cup when you measure it)
½ cup white (granulated) sugar, (or ½ cup colored decorator
sugar, or ½ cup white and colored decorator sugar mixed
together), for rolling dough balls55
Mix the butter and the sugar together and beat them with a mixer or a spoon until they look nice and fluffy. (That’s what the phrase “cream the butter and sugar” means if you see it in another recipe.)