CINNAMON JUMBLES

Cinnamon Jumbles are the best cookie, according to Betty, from 1890-1900. Supposedly, every city had their own variation of the recipe but this one is the basic. If you like cinnamon sugar you will like these. The cookie is very light, almost like a lady finger, and the cinnamon sugar on top really makes the cookie great. We shall see how they hold up overnight but they were very, very good last night!

HERMITS

I have reached the the final chapter of the book which honors the favorite cookie from each decade starting from the 1880's. Hermit cookies were supposed to be commonly tucked into lunch pails and sea chests as kids and men left for work or school ( or the sea since she specifically mentioned sea chests!). The contain nutmeg and cinnamon so have a holiday taste to them. They were easy to make and easy to eat. Yummy with a cup of tea!

COCONUT APRICOT TARTLETS

Interesting but I think they would be better as a breakfast item. The tart base is made from cream cheese, butter and flour and then topped with apricot jam and coconut. The whole thing is baked for about 9 minutes. The dough for the tart was refrigerated for about 6 hours before trying to roll it but it still was very difficult to work with. I had to use a lot of flour to get them off the counter and still they had questionable shapes, as you can tell from the picture. The recipe did not make very many so I don't know if UH will get any or if Alex will have eaten them all!

CHEESE SWIRL BROWNIES

Betty says that this recipe was created by a student from Ohio State that was interning in her kitchen. Alex does not know her...so he says!! The chocolate mixture is split into two parts with the cheese mixture in the middle. After the layering, you are supposed to draw a knife through all three layers to " marble" them. Well, the top layer was very hard to put on top of the cheese part so it was already very mixed and didn't require much extra mixing. However, it did not look swirled or marbled. My other complaint is that brownies should really have a lot of chocolate in them and these were lacking to my taste. The cheese filling was made with cottage cheese and was interesting but not great. It was moist but I would rather have a traditional brownie.

ORANGE OATMEAL COOKIES

I was looking for a recipe that would give lots of cookies so there would be enough for the tasters, UH and lots for Trish so she can start her carbo-loading for the Boston Marathon. She will be leaving Thursday night to run in the marathon on Monday. So......................GO TRISH!!!!! Anyway, about the cookies, they are crisp and tasty with a touch of nutmeg and orange. The only trick is to get them off the tray after sitting for just a few seconds to firm up and not to make them too big. The directions called for baking them 12-15 minutes but I found that about 9 1/2 was perfect, maybe because I made them smaller that called for. Whatever, they are good! Enjoy!

123 PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES

This is another "cheater" recipe that uses yellow cake mix as its base and then adds peanut butter, water and eggs. They were actually pretty good but will have to see how they do tomorrow after a humid night. Yesterday's cookies were good out of the oven but were disappointing today. These cookies were better if baked longer--even when they appeared to be too brown. I am hoping they will stay crispy for tomorrow!

CHOCOLATE CREAM CHEESE COOKIES

This is a "cheater" recipe that uses chocolate cake mix as a base with cream cheese, butter, egg, vanilla and coconut added to it. It was quick, easy and delicious. The dough was easy to work with after being refrigerated for about 1/2 hour and then dropped by hand onto cookie sheets. It was too sticky to use a teaspoon to drop them. The initial ones I baked about eight minutes and were good but I like them baked a bit longer. They are also very, very good with ice cream! Enjoy!

MINT MELTAWAYS

These cookies would be great for St. Patrick's Day. They are delicately minty and more of a shortbread than a cake cookie. They don't spread at all while cooking so I put many per cookie sheet and used all the dough on just two trays. A wonderful tea cookie!

CHOCOLATE COCONUT MERINGUE BITES

I haven't done something with chocolate lately so I decided to do this recipe, also because I love coconut. The bars are basically a chocolate chip cookie base with nuts and coconut added and a brown sugar meringue baked on top. Tasty but I feel that the cookie part was a bit dry. The recipe made enough for UH people so hope everyone enjoys them. Have a great weekend!

ALMOND MERINGUE SHORTBREAD

This shortbread has an interesting mix of flavors. The base is a standard shortbread which is baked and then topped with jam ( I used marionberry jam) after cooling it for a bit. While it was cooling, you make a cinnamon meringue which is placed on top of the jam and then returned to the oven to brown. Oh, the meringue is also covered with chopped almonds. I almost forgot that step and had to pull it out of the oven to add the nuts. When it was all done, it looked very pretty and was tasty but almost too many flavors for me with the nuts, cinnamon and fruit jam. I will be interested to get some feedback on this one!

GINGERBREAD APPLESAUCE BARS

Back to using gingerbread mix with some adaptations. This one calls for substituting applesauce for the water as well as adding nuts and raisins. The final touch is icing the bars with browned butter icing. I am a big fan of cooking with applesauce and these bars prove my point. They are moist and tasty. Without the icing they would probably be a good breakfast treat but the icing puts these into the dessert category. I don't care how the game ended yesterday, the Butler Bulldogs are my NCAA champs!!! What a game!!!

ZIMTSTERNE COOKIES

I have gone back to the Christmas cookie section to complete the ones that I did not have time for during the holidays. This is a Swiss Xmas cookie that did not give an English translation for the name. The recipe used Cinnamon and nutmeg to give it that holiday taste but they were not as crisp as I expected. The dough was rolled out and then baked after being washed with beaten egg whites. I never know how difficult it will be to work with cut-out cookies but this dough was actually very easy to roll, cut and transfer. However, I did not make them as thin as the recipe called for as usually that is a disaster and I was making these while watching the Red Sox/Yankees game and the Sox were behind. I didn't have the patience for dough being stuck to the counter. Maybe that is why they are not as crisp as I had hoped but I think it is more that the recipe called for 2 1/2 eggs. So, these are good cookies but not fantastic. Tomorrow night is the big basketball game!!!! GO BUTLER!!!!!!