Oatmeal Lace Cookies & Home, by Sara Reddy Coyne

I’ve been thinking a lot about Home lately. Not the home I have today, but the Home of my childhood; the one of family Sunday brunches with dad making epic omelets, mom scraping burnt toast into the sink, and me and my sister sipping fresh-squeezed orange juice and sharing the comics section of the newspaper, spread out giggling on the floor. The Home where all those Thanksgivings and Christmases took place, where summers stretched out far beyond the horizon, and winters were made warm with hot cocoa by the fire, or all of us gathered around a bowl of popcorn to watch a movie on VHS.

I’ve been thinking of this Home, and the sad truth is, the more I think about it, the less certain I am that Home ever existed.

Years of hard-earned cynicism have me doubting my own memories. Maybe I’ve simply watched It’s a Wonderful Life too many times, or have been too affected by my beloved Little Women (the mom of my childhood Home certainly does resemble Marmee in a her warm, wise ways).

We all know our memories are selective. But is Nostalgia cunning enough to completely rewrite our history?

I certainly hope not. Because I’m awfully fond of my memories — real or not.

As children, it doesn’t take much to be happy. We weren’t looking to be impressed, weren’t always expecting something better or newer or next. We could spend hours stalking bugs in the tall grass, happy for mom to deliver us an orange juice popsicle in the back yard, the syrup melting down our arms. It didn’t matter that mom made the popsicles from concentrate, or that there was only ever one flavor. They were simple, delicious, and reliable. Kind of like home.

So when I find myself craving Home, nothing, NOTHING says Home to me like simple, perfect oatmeal cookies.

My mom didn’t rely much on cookbooks. In fact, from what I can remember, we only had one in the kitchen: The Settlement Cook Book, which was first published in 1901, and guarantees the recipes are “The way to a man’s heart.”

This is a no-fuss cookbook: no pictures, little instruction, simple recipes. It’s packed full of good all-American home cooking: dumplings, butter cakes, baked biscuit desserts, pot roasts and stews. But what interested me most, back then and still now, are the cookies. Oatmeal Lace Cookies.

There are only five ingredients, and all you need is one bowl and a spoon to mix them with. Everything you need to make them you’ll likely already have on hand. These are the ultimate late-night, missing-home, looking-for-comfort nostalgic cookies: they’re chewy and crunchy and taste almost more like candy than cookie.

I absolutely adore the understated sparseness of the recipe itself, so I am leaving the language intact for your enjoyment. However, I’ve added a few notes at the bottom to help you along.

When you smell these cookies, and you dip their thin, lacey frames into your glass of milk, I promise your adulthood skepticism will melt away as the brown sugar and butter melts on your tongue. And with a single bite, you will be Home again.

Oatmeal Lace Cookies (from The Settlement Cook Book)

1/2 cup melted butter
2 ½ cups rolled oats
1 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 egg, beaten

Melt butter, add to dry ingredients. Add egg, mix well. Drop from spoon 1 inch apart on greased cookie sheet. Bake 8-10 minutes at 350. Let stand 1 minute, remove from pan.

*Writer’s notes: I recommend adding 1/8 – 1/4 teaspoon salt. Also, keep each cookie just under 1 tablespoon, as they spread quite dramatically during cooking, and become very thin (and lace-like). Allow the edges to grow deep golden brown before removing from oven. And finally, I found I needed to let them rest for 2-3 minutes before they were stiff enough to remove from the cookie sheet. Best served with a glass of cold milk, and some warm nostalgia.

“No banana.” I checked one more basket, and held something up. “Banana muffin?”

Greg took the muffin. Locally baked and individually wrapped, the sticker read:

BANANA BREAD

He turned it over a few times. “But… it says Banana Bread.”  He looked at me.  “It’s a muffin.”

“Hmm,” I said.  “Technically, it’s the same thing, I mean, pretty much the same batter.  Just a different shape.”

He was still turning it over. Oh, dear.

I looked to our friend Barista Girl, behind the counter. “I don’t know,” she said. “They’re just labeling them like that now.”

All three of us looked at the muffin-bread.  I imagined a stream of banana bread lovers, weak from confusion.

“They shouldn’t do that,” she offered.

“No,” I said. “they shouldn’t mess with names like that.  Muffin is muffin and bread is bread.”

We agreed.  I mean, you can’t just change names.  You can’t decide that stick is suddenly leaf or dog is now called table.  There are rules about these things.  Peoples’ heads will explode.

Back home I was baking, and thought, there are exceptions to the name thing, even delicious ones, like these Two-Bite Jam Tarts.   Are they a cookie or a tart? They use Cream Cheese Dough, one I frequently roll into rugelach and other cookies.  But, as I noted to Josie, they have little edges.  They stand up and hold jam.  And they’re flaky, too – all clearly pointing to tart.

Josie had a mouthful of crumbs and raspberry. “Cookie,” she said.

“Oh, no, tart. I think – see, see how it’s like a little galette, with the edges…”

In a flash there was cold milk, three more treats and she was gone, leaping two steps at a time.  Name talk over.

“Whatever,” she threw down behind her, “they’re just good.”

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These mini tarts – I’m making the call here – are little gems.   They tip the happiness scale because the easy-to-satisfaction ratio is so absurdly high.   A one-step dough, simple rolling skills and a bit of jam are all you need to enjoy warm two-bite tarts.  Flaky little cookies.  Whatever you call them – they won’t last long.

Almost-done preserves and jams sitting around? This is their moment.

Ziplocs make handy disposable pastry bags: fill with jam, cut a small opening, and pipe about a teaspoon onto each circle.

Pull up and pinch edges all around jam, pinching and overlapping slightly to seal. No uniformity necessary – just pinch and have faith.

Optional pistachio version – for Greg the pistachio-lover, who just wants banana bread to look like banana bread.

Baked, and they’re sunny perfection – actually, imperfection. Just look at those nooks, those crannies, the lopsides and jam spills!  Even my orderly self embraces their sweet mess.  A sifting of powdered sugar, however…

…brings them right back to perfect.

—————————

Two-Bite Jam Tarts

click me, I’m a printable recipe!

1 recipe Cream Cheese Dough (below)

Jam or Preserves, your choice – I like blackberry, raspberry and orange marmalade

pistachios or pecans, chopped (optional)

powdered sugar, for sprinkling

Dough:  make Cream Cheese Dough as directed.  After kneading lightly, cut dough in half.  Wrap and reserve half for another use (snacking is good.)

Roll remaining half of dough on lightly floured surface to about 1/8″ thick.  Using a medium-round fluted cutter – I use a 2 1/2″ round – cut circles from dough, re-rolling scraps and cutting circles until done.*

Preheat oven to 375 F.

Fill Tarts: line baking sheet with parchment paper or foil.  Transfer dough circles to baking sheet, fitting as many as you can – as you fill and pinch the tarts, you’ll have room for more.

Place jam (how much you have is up to you) in a ziploc bag.  Keeping top open, twist tightly over jam and cut small opening at the tip.  Hold tip facing upwards until you are ready to pipe!  Standing over baking sheet, place tip just above one dough circle and release about one teaspoon of jam in center.  Working quickly, repeat with remaining circles, changing jam as desired.

(alternately, you can spoon jam onto dough – but once you get the hang of piping, you’ll appreciate the speed)

Pinch Crusts: using both hands, pick up edges of dough circle and pinch together and upwards, working all the way around until complete, resembling a pie crust or raised bottlecap.  Repeat with all mini-tarts until done.

Optional nuts: before baking, sprinkle finely chopped pistachios or pecans over tarts

Bake:  bake tarts at 375 F for 15-18 minutes, until edges and bottom are lightly browned, and jam is bubbling.  Remove from oven and cool slightly.

Serve:  sift powdered sugar lightly over tarts, and serve.  Or just…eat.  Enjoy!

* with this flaky dough, a fluted round cutter will produce a raised pattern along the sides and create a terrific little “tart crust.”

makes about 30 two-bite tarts (or cookies. Your call.)

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Cream Cheese Dough (also found here)

8 oz cream cheese, cold
8 oz unsalted butter, cold
2 cups all-purpose flour
pinch salt

Place flour and salt in food processor and process a few seconds, to blend. Chunk butter and cream cheese in pieces over flour, then process, using on-off motion, until dough just forms a ball. Turn out onto floured surface and knead lightly into a smooth mass.

Roll, shape and bake into tart crusts, sweet turnovers, rugelach, and other cookies.  Keeps several days wrapped in the refrigerator, and freezes well.

They will go to the new baby’s house. They will get dipped in your uncle’s coffee, unwrapped in the dorm, munched over papers. They will comfort on the funeral table. Mandelbread is a cookie you can’t live without, but of course that’s because I never have – and why would I want to try? Every family has that plate of something and to me, the humble slice is plainly perfect.

Mrs. DuBois’ Yummy Mandelbread

This recipe is adapted from a favorite and extremely dirty spiral-bound community book. It was proudly contributed by one Mrs. E. DuBois, who dubbed them Yummy Mandelbread. Thanks, Mrs. DB – they are.

1/4 lb (one stick) butter, softened at room temperature
1 heaping tablespoon soft shortening *
1 cup granulated sugar
3 eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 cup toasted whole almonds, chopped (optional)

for sprinkling:

cinnamon
dash nutmeg
granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 375 F.

Use an electric mixer to cream the butter and shortening. Stop to scrape the bowl and add the vanilla and almond extracts. Continue beating butter mixture until creamy and well-combined. Add the sugar and eggs, one at a time, to smooth.

In a separate bowl, combine dry ingredients to blend – flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder.

Add dry ingredients to the butter mixture, beating on low speed until dough is just combined. If using chopped almonds, add nuts to dough and briefly mix, just long enough to evenly distribute.

Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead briefly to smooth. Divide dough into four equal parts. Using both hands, roll each piece of dough into a cylinder, each about as long as your cookie sheet and approximately 2″ wide.

Transfer dough cylinders to prepared cookie sheets (greased or parchment-lined), two per sheet and spaced at least 2″ apart. Using the palm of your hand, flatten the cylinders slightly, working down each length until done.

In a small bowl, mix equal parts cinnamon and sugar to make about 1/2 cup. Add a generous dash of nutmeg and mix to blend.

Sprinkle cinnamon sugar over each rolled dough strip. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until strips are golden and just firmed up. Remove from oven and cool until safe to handle.

Using a thin serrated knife, cut each strip on the diagonal to form approx. 18-20 pieces. Arrange cut pieces on the cookie sheets and sprinkle generously with cinnamon sugar. Return cookies to oven until golden brown and tops appear dry, about 15 minutes. Watch carefully and do not over-brown. Cool on racks and enjoy!

Mandelbread keeps very well at room temperature, sealed in plastic bags, up to a week. For longer storage, they freeze beautifully.

* resist the urge to omit the tablespoon of shortening. Mandelbread are frequently made with vegetable oil or shortening – Mrs. DuBois actually named “Spry” – so as to remain kosher, using neither meat nor milk. Many modern versions use butter, but a small amount of shortening keeps the cookie texture light. Crisco’s soft “sticks” measure easily and mix well.

Josie graduated from 6th grade last night, and though it’s a big deal, it’s remarkable what a big deal they make out of it these days. There has been so much eating and cooking – pizzas for a crowd, calzones for lunch, sandwiches and salads and root beer and real beer. With the warm weather, there is a constant flow of ice from my freezer. There are cookie trays and birthday cakes and baking…

…mixing and dipping and sugaring. As if a life-altering promotion to junior high isn’t enough, my sweet girl is turning twelve tomorrow. Oh, time is flying fast, but she can still be sweet – until she opens her spicy twelve-year old mouth to me with all the knowledge I couldn’t possibly have. Don’t tell her I said this – but thank goodness for spice. Life would be quite dull without it, no?

I don’t recall parties and presents after 6th grade, just a continuing struggle with frizzy hair, Sea Breeze and humiliation from older girls. This is not happening for Josie. She seems to be having a delightful time at this age, and that makes us pretty happy.

Sorry about the lack of recipes and food porn, and please forgive my momentary lapse into proud-mom blogging. But around here my kid is the girl of the hour, so today we’ll give her the last word. It’s not very clear, but I think the sound of being twelve and the itch for drama comes through. From Monday’s recital, here’s the evening that began a week of family, food, and everything nice.

Yes I said Cracker Barrel, the “Old Country Store” restaurant that’s not far off the road, where you see a lot of breakfasts served sunny side up. Their stores up front are full of “vintage” American stuff – cast iron pans and Slinkys and Moonpies and cookie jars. Some of it is crap, and some of it is pretty, pretty enough to pick up and turn over, like my pink-flowered cup and saucer – made in China, I could not believe it.

The set was so delicate and proper it might have rested in the queen’s hand, but I glanced around to check, and I was still in Des Moines. For less than ten dollars they’ve been faking it on my table ever since.

And doing a lovely job, too!

I heard everything from “love that cup!” to “I want a cookie NOW. RIGHT NOW.”

Agreed. It says high tea, and Grandma’s sideboard, and you know, it does say gimme two oatmeal chocolate chip cookies RIGHT NOW. And that handle! Just looking at it makes me roll out scones and sit up straight. There is even a painful backstory involving frozen scones, QVC and the Mall of America, but…another day.

Today, let’s have a contest. We all agree that the pink-flowered cup and saucer are lovely. But tell me, cookie freaks and china lovers, where did they from?

A few clues. I got this cup and saucer:

…on a U.S. road trip, but it’s not U.S.-made.

…somewhere ‘everything old is new again’

…a place where you see the sunny side of life.

The answer may surprise you. I’ve had them for years and it still surprises me.

What – a prize? You want all this sly talk and a prize, too? Greedy, greedy, but here’s the deal – if you can correctly identify where I collected these lovelies, I will mail you an extra-tacky postcard from Lawrence, Kansas with the Oatmeal Chocolate Chip recipe on the back. Wow! That’s way better than big cash money, eh?

It’s a place you buy things, not a city, but extra chocolate chips to the genius who gets the city too. I won’t confirm the answer until tomorrow morning, so you may guess as many times as you like, and all correct guesses win the recipe. I might just print the recipe anyway, but don’t tell the others.

Good cookie recipes live forever – especially this one.

The recipe, not the cookies. They live a very short, delicious life.

Even oatmeal cookies become The Beautiful Guide to Softly Lit Eating.

Now I also want to have tea in their garden.

I live just a block away but we haven’t met, so I walk past their magnificent house every day with my dog and her pretty red leash – who knows? It’s spring, and Cleo is very shiny in the light. One morning they could step outside, wave and say “my, that’s a sweet dog.”

Cleo blinks like a baby seal.

“You wait there,” friendly brick-lady will say. “I’ll just bring out some tea.”

Then I will play it cool.

“Me – wow, okay! Can you wait like 45 minutes?” I start jogging backwards. “I’ll go home and bake some madeleines…be right back!”

I am a cool customer. “Can I make a centerpiece? Some daffodils?”

Isn’t there always a place we’d like to be invited, but wind up invited somewhere else? Tea in a neighboring garden is where I’d like to be.

Everyone has a happy go-to image – one you summon when you are where you’d rather not be. I have my breezy would-be tea under the trees – two wire chairs in the grass, a plate of cookies on the table, a kind neighbor and the first hours of spring.

Ooh, that is a thought. Time to butter those shell-shaped tins.

Madeleines do make fine introductions. Carry these and every door is open!

Madeleines

Beautiful scalloped madeleine tins are traditionally used for these French cake-like tea cookies, but try shallow mini-muffin pans for a similar effect.

yield: 2 dozen cookies

2/3 cup superfine sugar (granulated sugar is fine)
3 eggs
1 egg yolk
juice of 1/2 lemon
pinch of salt
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, melted

Preheat oven to 350º F and butter or spray 24 madeleine molds.

Beat the sugar, whole eggs, egg yolk, lemon juice, and salt in an electric mixer bowl on low speed until well-blended. Fold in the flour until well-combined. Slowly add the melted butter to the mixture, and stir to blend.

Spoon the batter into the molds, filling no more than 2/3 full.

Bake the cookies for 20-25 minutes, or until slightly golden. Unmold cookies and cool on wire racks. Sift powdered sugar lightly over madeleines and serve, preferably warm.

from The Charms of Tea, Reminiscences and Recipes

We commemorate the triumph with, um, a three-cornered cookie. And I dutifully made the three-cornered cookies, and did something our ancestors did not do, I photographed the cookies for the sacrificial blog and uploaded them to the holy site of Flickr.

Last night, I thought “it is time to blog those cookies.” And I wanted to give you accurate hamantaschen reporting you can trust, so I went Googling for a little history. Know what I found?

Almost immediately, I saw “Craving Hamantaschen” at the MenuPages Blog, Boston edition.

I glanced at the picture. Mmm, good-looking hamantaschen. Wait a minute….blue-rimmed plate…nicely filled cookies…familiar cotton napkin…Sweet Sugared Haman! I showed it to Greg.

“Yeah, those look good,” he said.

Notice anything?

“Well, no…hey, is that our plate?”

Uh-huh. That is our dining room table, too.

The bad news: someone beat me to the punch with my own cookies! The good news: because they gave me credit, I decided that this blatant cookie-swiping would not prevent me from giving you the post you deserve.

Hamantaschen are traditionally made with poppyseed or prune filling, but modern versions include everything from chocolate chip to mango to peanut butter. Greg grew up making these cookies every year with his Grandma Bertha, who would just as soon fill hamantaschen with peanut butter as run naked through the streets.

In our house, sweet poppyseed filling, or mohn, still rules.

Something our forebears never thought of: the food processor.

If only Haman had owned a black lab. He would have been a much nicer person.

The chilled sugar dough gets rolled and cut into circles, then topped with the poppyseed.

Purists will make their own fillings, but as I see it, we didn’t survive thousands of years so that I could stand around grinding seeds. Solo fillings – poppyseed, prune, apricot, cherry – are available in most supermarkets and work very well.

Make a triangle using your thumbs and forefingers – these are the hamantaschen fingers. Use them to pull up three sides of a filled cookie circle, pinch them together, and form a neatly stuffed triangle.

Repeat, bake, enjoy.

If you are lucky enough to live in cities like Chicago or that other city, New York, you can buy super-sized hamantaschen at bakeries year-round. Or you can try filling a few of your own right now. They say at St. Patrick’s Day that you don’t have to be Irish. To enjoy hamantaschen, you don’t have to be Jewish.

Just snack-ish.

Cookbook author Joan Nathan’s hamantaschen recipe is delicious. Give it a try!

The school clock ticked,

…and parents were asked to turn cell phones off. Some forgot.

“Interplanetary.”

“Difficult.”

“Mercurial.”

And that’s just a few. There was also tempestuous, theologist, preengagement, and, perhaps the cruelest word of all, “misspelling.” Which some poor young soul (not Josie) misspelled.

Josie here got #2 – mercifully, her favorite KU basketball player’s number. That would be Conner Teahan, or as he’s known at 819, “the cute one.” She and her pal Emily once held up a huge hand-made sign at a KU game:

I didn’t know anyone called anyone a dreamboat anymore.  But I will say he has a nice shaggy Keith Partridge thing about him.

Back to the spelling bee. In the photo above, you can see that #3 is really thrilled to be here. #1? Mr. Fidgety Neon Green Crocs? He won the whole thing.

Bittersweet – but it was not a loss.

There was a cheering section. Favorite cookies were made, with raspberry punch and lox and bagels.

Girls ran through the house giggling and trailing jelly beans. Good thing we got the central vac put in.

We’re proud of her. She’s tough, she has a great sense of humor, and she’ll be back next year.

I g-u-a-r-a-n-t-e-e!

Grandma Marsha & Grandpa Geno gave Josie a “B”-all, end-all souvenir of the day.