Mrs. Goldberg's Cookies

These are the cookies of my childhood. The cookies Grandma made. The cookies she always called "Mrs. Goldberg's cookies," (which I find adorably charming now, that she felt we need to use a respectful moniker for the cookbook writer, Molly Goldberg) or "thumbprint cookies," but which are, in the book they come from, called simply "Jelly Cookies."

These are the cookies I've always made, too. They are the cookies I'm known for. They are the cookies my friends used to ask me to make for special occasions. Our old roommate, M, once asked me to make several dozen for a fundraiser at a theater he was managing; he came home that night to tell me that Ben Vereen and John Ritter had both raved about my cookies.

Really, I don't have to go any further now, do I? You're sold, right?

They're also the very first cookies Em and N made, too, since I made it a point to use their tiny little thumbs to make the impressions when I'd bake these when they were babies. (I actually have a shot of Em 'helping' me make these when she was maybe a year old; if I can find it and scan it, I'll add it here.)

I will say, however, that I'm not really sure how these are "Jewish" cookies. But there they are, on page 133 of my copy of The Molly Goldberg Jewish Cookbook. Actually, it's my third copy of this cookbook. Because it gets used so often, and the copies I've always had were so old...they tend to fall apart.

I love that I have cookbooks I use so often they fall apart. Something in my wannabe-happy-homemaker's heart finds that indescribably wonderful.

And with that, I give you:

Mrs. Goldberg's Cookies

[A note: There is, in my opinion, never a reason to make only a small number of these. They're full of butter and sugar, and you can't even try to pretend that you're being virtuous when you eat them. And so, I pretty much always triple the recipe in the cookbook. Thus, I'm giving you, here, the tripled recipe. Feel free to scale back down to the original if you want. But you'll regret it. Don't say I didn't warn you.]

3/4 pound butter
1 cup sugar
3 egg yolks
3 cups sifted flour (Side note: Does anyone sift anymore? Molly says to sift, but I never do it. Does it make a difference?)
1/4 tsp salt (The original recipe calls for 1/8 tsp, so this isn't tripled. But I tend to only have salted butter on hand, so I probably don't even need to go up to 1/4 tsp.)
3 tsp vanilla
1-1/2 tsp orange extract
One or more of your favorite fruit-flavored jams or jellies (We tend toward the Grandma-traditional apricot, but eschew her choice of grape for something like boysenberry, most times)

1. Prepare cookie sheets with parchment paper. (I know. We're obsessed here at NTMC with parchment paper for baking. Trust us. It's for a reason.) Preheat oven to 325 F.

2. Cream butter and sugar together until light. (I do all of this in my Kitchen Maid stand mixer, by the way. But before I had one, I just let the butter get reallllllly soft and did it with a fork. Gave me some muscles, I tell you.)

3. Add egg yolks; beat well.

4. Add flour and salt; mix well.

5. Add vanilla and orange extract; mix well.

6. Shape dough into walnut-sized balls. Using your thumb, make a slight depression in each cookie; fill with jelly. (The book says about a half teaspoon per cookie, but I just eyeball it. As you can see above, that sometimes means they get a little sloppy. I like my cookies sloppy.)

7. Bake for about 15 minutes, or until "delicately browned." (God, I love Molly.) As you can see above, I underbaked the batch I photographed. Whoops. They were still awesome. There's something about the orange extract that makes these cookies taste like...well, like childhood. OK. My childhood. But still.

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By the way, I just wanted to let you guys know--OK, I wanted to brag to you guys--that I've added the extra vodka and the simple syrup to my limoncello, so that it is now in its second phase, and that on our anniversary (March 17; yes, the two Jews got hitched on St. Patrick's day, and even signed our ketubah in green ink) we will be breaking it out for a first glass. A little early, true, so I'll let the rest sit for a week or two more, but still.

I can't wait. I'll brag more then.

Best GFCF chocolate chip cookies

Last fall I went on a bit of a GFCF cookie exploratory. We don't eat a ton of cookies in the house, but they are nice to have on hand for when a cookie just feels right. Store-bought GF cookies are expensive ($4.99 for a dozen) and kinda blech.

My all-time favorite cookie, hands-down, is a chocolate chip cookie. In fact, I have a little bit of a problem with them. I'm addicted. Homemade chocolate chip cookies are something I just. can't. stop. eating.

Last fall I began scouring the internet for GF chocolate chip cookie recipes. The first 3 recipes I tried were so-so. Edible, but nothing to make me stop looking.

Then I decided to check out what my favorite GF blogger, Erin at M.A.G. - Adventures in ASD and GFCF living, had to offer.

I found the winner. My search stopped.

These cookies are soft and moist and taste every bit as delicious as the chocolate chip cookies that I've been making for years.

In addition to being free of gluten and casein, they are soy-free as well!

Because four different flours are used to make these cookies, mixing up the dry ingredients seems to take the longest. So what I do now is mix up the dry ingredients for 4 or 5 batches rather than just one.

This is easily accomplished by using quart-sized ziploc bags in an assembly-line fashion. I just dump the ingredients in each bag (I don't bother sifting, I can do that when I'm ready to make the actual cookies) and toss them in the freezer. When I'm ready to make cookies, all I have to do is mix my "butter" and sugars, the egg and vanilla, and then add the dry ingredients from my ziploc bag.

Without further ado, the recipe.

GFCFSF Chocolate Chip Cookies
(courtesy of M.A.G. - Adventures in ASD and GFCF Living)

1/2 cup sorghum flour
1/2 cup amaranth flour
1/2 cup potato starch flour
1/2 cup tapioca starch flour
1 tsp. xanthan gum
1 tsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt

scant 1 cup (8 oz) dairy free, soy free margarine
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 large egg
1 tsp. vanilla extract
10 ounces dairy free, soy free chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Sift together the sorghum flour through the salt, set aside.

In a large bowl, cream together the margarine and the sugars until light and fluffy.
Add the egg, beat well.
Add the vanilla and beat to combine.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix until fully incorporated, scraping down the sides as necessary. This will take a bit of work if you do it by hand - don't worry if it looks dry at first, it will come together and look perfect in a minute.

You don't want the mixture to be too wet, or the cookies will flatten out and get crisp in the oven. (If you like flat, crispy cookies, then increase the margarine to a generous 1 cup.)

Fold in the chocolate chips. Drop by generous teaspoonfuls onto a greased cookie sheet 2 inches apart.

Bake about 12 minutes, or until the bottoms and edges of the cookies are very lightly browned.

Remove from oven and let cool in pan for 30 seconds before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes about 2 dozen cookies.

Tips: I find these cookies bake better on parchment paper. I make smaller cookies, and get about 3 1/2 dozen out of the recipe.

Note: If you don't need to be soy-free, you can use your regular dairy-free butter.

Guest post: Breakfast cookies

(hi, this is jennyalice with a sneaky little guest post.)

My son eats a lot of food. No really, a lot of food, and since he has a physical disability, he needs quite a bit of help at meal time. Breakfast is always a blur at our house, and in an effort to be most efficient, get out of the house on time, and offer Jack more opportunity for independence, we have tried every cereal on the market. They all end up in little pieces at the bottom of the box, or scattered all over the floor. So we want him to be able to feed himself, and it has to be fast, and his sister has to like it. Frustrated by the $4.00 price tag on 5 ounces of granola nuggets, I decided to try to make cereal cookies. This is my first try. It is basically a takeoff on any oatmeal cookie recipe, with cereal instead of the oatmeal.

I use a professional grade KitchenAid stand mixer and aluminum jelly roll (cookie) pans in a non-convection electric oven.

Ingredients

• 3 eggs (I used large, not extra large)
• 2 sticks of softened butter (I do not ever bake with margarine)
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 2T vanilla extract
• 1 cup white flour
• 2/3 cup wheat flour
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1 15 oz box muesli cereal (I used Safeway brand)
• 1/4-1/2 cup oatmeal (as much as needed to make the batter more on the stiff side.)

Directions

1. Pre-heat oven to 350F
   
2. Cream butter and sugars
3. Add vanilla
4. Add eggs one at a time, beat until smooth
5. If you are a good person you will sift your flours, baking soda and baking powder. But since you are not a superhuman, just try not to have any hard nuggets of baking soda or baking powder, then with the mixer on a low to medium speed, slowly add the flours, baking soda, and baking powder.
6. Mix in the box of muesli. You could hand mix at this point, but I have a heavy duty stand mixer, so I make it do the work.
7. Add in the oatmeal a little at a time until the cookie dough is more on the stiff side.

I use cookie sheets with parchment paper to cook most all of my baked goods. It allows me to place all of the batter onto the sheets, then I can slip baked goods onto the counter and a new sheet with raw dough onto the pan and pop it back into the oven faster. No lag time between baking and I don't need to get my hands dirty very 13 minutes.

I tested three different sizes for the cookies. A 1 tablespoon dough ball makes a normal-size cookie, and was more on the soft side. A 1/2 tablespoon dough ball, made a small cookie, and would probably work just fine for most people, but I really wanted them to be "one bite" cookies so there would be less of a chance of my kid taking a bite then dropping the rest. I settled on a fat 1 1/2 tsp. So I just scooped up batter 1 tablespoon at a time and divided it into four little dabs. This made cookies slightly larger than a quarter, which was perfect for my family.

Bake cookies for 13 minutes at 350F, slightly less time if you want them softer; we wanted crisp. This recipe makes, um, a lot of little cookies; it filled a 10 cup container.

I do not know how long these keep, they were finished within 3 days. Even my husband ate them (note to self: do not tell husband that muesli has dates or he will never eat them again). I have several other types of cereal in the cupboard, so I'm going to keep making different kinds until I can find the tastiest, highest protein, lowest cost, batch of breakfast cookies that my family will still eat. Once I figure out a few that work, my goal is to get a ton of cereal on super sale, then spend a day and make batch after batch of breakfast cookies, and freeze them in 1 gallon zip-top bags. I'm sure they will freeze well, since oatmeal cookies do. Of course the way my family mowed through them, it's possible I won't need to freeze any at all.

Gluten-free snickerdoodles

Snickerdoodles are one of my all-time favorite cookies (and also one of my favorite words to say!) C'mon, say it: Snickerdoodle. Snickerdoodle. Snickerdoodle. You have heard of Snickerdoodles, right? I was shocked a couple of days ago when a friend said, "What are those?" when I mentioned this cookie.

With the holiday baking spirit starting to take over in my house, I decided now is the time to find out if gluten-free Snickerdoodles would be just as delicious as the traditional ones.

I searched the web looking for recipes, thinking that I might try several, but one in particular kept surfacing time and again with rave reviews. There were other GF recipes that were for variations on the original, but I was looking for the tried and true cinnamon/sugary delight known as Snickerdoodles.

The recipe is from The Gluten Free Baker by Robin Ryberg

Gluten-Free Snickerdoodles

1/2 cup shortening

3/4 cup sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup potato starch

3/4 cup + 2 Tbsp corn starch

1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp xantham gum

1/2 tsp salt

2 Tbsp water

Cinnamon-Sugar Coating

Mix together

3 Tbsp sugar and 3/4 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, cream together shortening and sugar. Add egg and vanilla. Mix well.

In a separate bowl, sift together potato starch, corn starch, baking soda, baking powder, xantham gum and salt.

Add the dry ingredients along with the 2 Tbsp of water to the sugar/shortening. Mix very well to eliminate any lumps in the dough.

Lightly oil hands or spray with cooking spray (I sprayed) to handle the dough as it is quite sticky.

Shape into small balls using a slightly-rounded teaspoon of dough for each cookie. Roll each ball in the cinnamon sugar mixture.

Place on a lightly greased cookie sheet (again, I used cooking spray). The original recipe calls for each ball to be pressed to about 1/3-inch even thickness, but I forgot to do that after the first batch and didn't notice a difference.

Bake for 10-12 minutes. A single cookie should be removed at the shortest baking time to test for doneness. Browning is not a good indicator for these cookies.

This recipe made 3 dozen, 2 dozen of which were consumed practically on the spot. The remaining dozen were nibbled away all day.

Now that I've shared one of my favorite cookies, please share yours! I looooove cookies!

Oatmeal cookies with cranberries and white chocolate

God, I love these cookies. I guess it's the cranberries and white chocolate that make them holiday-ish, but the truth is, they're good whenever and easy to make, and did I mention that I love them? The basic "oatmeal cookie" part of the recipe is pretty much straight off the lid of the Quaker Oats container, but instead of raisins, I kind of go my own way here. And, of course, I use butter (though I think the original calls for margarine).

Here's what you need:

2 sticks of butter, softened
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups of oatmeal (I prefer the quick oats—it's a texture thing—but the old fashioned oats are also fine)
1 cup of cranberries (I use the Craisins)
1 heaping, generous, big cup of white chocolate chips

Heat the oven to 350 degrees and prepare your cookie sheets. Parchment paper is a lifesaver here.

Whisk together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt, set aside. With a mixer, cream the butter and slowly add the two sugars. Add the eggs and vanilla. Beat well.

Now add the combined flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Stir in the oats (I use the slowest mixer speed for this one). You'll need to mix in the Craisins and white choc. chips by hand. As a little aside, one of my most favorite kitchen tools is my cookie scoop. It looks just like an ice cream scoop, but smaller. Look at those fabulous uniform balls of dough!!

Okay, back to the recipe. Drop the dough onto a parchment paper lined cookie sheet and bake for about 10-12 minutes, until just lightly golden.

You want to seriously pay attention to the bake time here. The cookies will overcook very fast!! Let cool on a wire rack. I get about 5 dozen cookies from this recipe.

These are great packaged for gifts in fancy tins or boxes, or will keep for about a week in a ziploc bag. They also freeze beautifully. And I hear they are one of Santa's favorites!

Mandelbrot (No, not the mathematician)

In what is apparently, though inadvertently, an ethnic cookie bakeoff between me and Niksmom (are you dying to try her krumkake as much as I am?), I present to you what may well be my favorite Jewish dessert.

You call them biscotti. But we? We call them mandelbrot, which literally means almond (mandel) bread (brot). Are they the same thing? Oy, if I had the time to research that, I'd be a rich woman. (OK, not really. Unless some ridiculously rich person was just dying to know the answer, and too lazy to Google.) So instead, let me put it this way. They sure taste a lot alike.*

Anyway. The best thing about mandelbrot, from a Kosher perspective, is that they are naturally pareve. (Pareve means neutral--made with neither meat or dairy or their derivatives. Somewhat confusingly, eggs are not considered dairy when you're talking Kosher, so the fact that these have eggs does not make them dairy.)

When I say they're 'naturally' pareve, I mean that you don't have to mess with the original recipe to omit butter or milk in order to serve them with a meat meal. They are perfect just the way they are. And while I don't keep Kosher myself, I have friends who do, and I attend potlucks at a temple where Kosher laws need to be obeyed. Knowing that bringing mandelbrot will never be a problem, no matter what is being served? Priceless.

They fact that they are simply delicious? Priceless-er.

Mandelbrot (from my mother's recipe box to my own, though I'm guessing this one came from further up the family tree)

3 eggs
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup oil (use a neutral one, like canola)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup ground almonds (I ground the whole almonds shown here in my food processor)

Preheat oven to 350.

Mix the first four ingredients in a large bowl, starting with the sugar, then add the last two (dry) ingredients a little at a time, until wet.

Prepare two cookie sheets. (My mother's instruction is to grease them. I would be literally lost, baking-wise, without parchment paper to line my cookie sheets. Parchment can be hard to find in the grocery store--only one of the two big-name grocery stores around here carries it--and that surprises me, because whereas I used to burn stuff ALL THE TIME, I now pretty much never burn anything I'm baking. Miracle stuff, I tell you. Miracle stuff. But, hey. Do whatever you want. I'm just sayin'...if the mondel burns, don't come crying to me.)

Wet your hands with cold water, and divide the dough (it's STICKY) into four parts. Keep wetting your hands as needed as you spread the dough out into thin 'loaves,' two on each cookie sheet.

Bake the loaves at 350 for about 25 minutes. They should be, as my mother instructs, "quite golden" when you take them out.

But wait. Not so fast. Take them out one tray at a time, because you need to cut the loaves while they're still soft, and this dough hardens quickly once it's out of the oven.

Slice each loaf into strips. (For some reason, I always do them on an angle, almost like they're little London broils. I have no idea why, except that it's the way my mom did them. I think. And if not, it's because that's the way I think my mom did them.) Now bring out the other tray, and slice those loaves.

Turn each strip onto one side, then return the tray to the oven, toasting the mandelbrot for about 10 minutes.

Remove, and let cool. Eat. And eat. And eat.

These are really mild tasting, but unbearably delicious. So delicious, in fact, that even though this recipe makes probably upwards of three dozen 'brot,' I often double it. I bring them as hostess gifts to holiday parties, potlucks, etc. They're somehow just a squidge classier in feel than regular old cookies, and yet they're even easier to make, in my opinion. Win win!

*Hey, does anyone out there have a homemade biscotti recipe they'd be willing to dig out? We could probably settle this by comparing recipes, methinks. Or we could have a mandelbrot/biscotti taste test. Yeah! That's the ticket...The ticket to obesity, I mean.