Holiday cookies

Let's face it, holiday Christmas cookies aren't that healthy, physically. But they are a simple way of lifting Christmas spirits, especially if you have someone to share them with. I made these for a December 1 picnic (and am only now posting about it, my bad!). But there were other deserts and mine required the effort of decorating them, so I came back home with most of them.

These are from a 1975 cookie cookbook put out by Better Homes and Gardens. That's only about middle-aged for my cookbook collection. If I'd had that cookbook when it was new, I would have been making them as a junior high student in eighth grade enrolled in home economics. I remember that my seventh grade home economics teacher to a great extent, and my eighth grade home economics teacher to a lesser extent, wanted to teach us the newest trends in home economics. So we learned things like outdoor cooking, how to set up a household budget and how advertising tries to trick us. Great stuff I hope all junior high children have an opportunity to learn today. I don't think we did learn how to make sugar cookies.

I'm not so sure the women's magazines and books were encouraging our mothers to help us bake anything but the most traditional of cookies in 1975. However, this cookie recipe makes a not too sweet base for any cookie shapes or cookie décor you wish. I also thought the addition of orange peel and the option of substituting orange juice for milk were nice touches. I couldn't see not using the orange I had just grated the peel off of, so I did use that orange and added a very small amount of water to yield 1/3 cup of juice.

 I really can't say it's healthier than being not to sweet. Most more modern recipes will eliminate, at the very least, the shortening. In this day of gluten-free and keto, they possibly also eliminate the sugars and flours, substituting things like maple syrup, honey or coconut sugar for the sugar, and coconut or almond flour for the plain white flour this recipe calls for. Of course, on the keto diet, they may eliminate the peanut butter too.

PEANUT BUTTER CUTOUT COOKIES

1/2 cup shortening

1/2 cup peanut butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

12 cup granulated sugar 

1egg

2 teaspoons shredded orange peel

1/3 cup orange juice (or milk)

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt ( I put less)

Cream shortening, peanut butter and sugars together. Blend in egg, orange peel and juice or milk. Sift flour, baking soda and salt into the creamed mixture. Stir. Cover the dough and chill it two to three hours. (I chilled mine overnight, about 12 hours, with no problems.)

Roll out the cookie dough to 1/8" thickness, cut into desired shapes. Place on greased cookie sheet to bake in 350 degree oven for 8 to 10 minutes. This recipe can make four dozen cookies if the dough is rolled thin enough.

I decorated my cookies with less than $10 worth of icing and colored sugars I found at the grocery store in between my house and this park. Ironically, I found another half-used container of red sugar in my cupboard after the picnic. I also later figured out that the tube of icing will flow better if microwaved briefly. I'm not sure I had time that day to make my own icing and color my own sugars, but even if so, such a recipe wasn't in this cookbook. 

If I make these cookies again, there actually is another recipe one page forward in the same cookbook I'll try next time. It has no peanut butter, but also less sugar (only brown) and no shortening. It does have honey and spices. Sounds delicious, and maybe - unlike the peanut butter cutout cookies - tasty enough to eat without décor. Or, since my husband is a huge fan of licorice, I'll try the recipe listed right after these peanut butter cookies called Anise Cutouts. Or, in one of my Sunset cookbooks, there is a recipe that has no peanut butter, but has both orange peel and anise. 

For decorating, other ideas I'll possibly try are spreading the cutout cookies with the slightly warmed icing, and topping that with peppermint or any kind of nuts. Maybe I also would find a good recipe for homemade icing and sugars.

But, I usually only make one holiday cookie recipe a year, if that. And, other than my personal favorite, Cocoa Drop cookies, I usually try new recipes. I may make cutout cookies one year, Cocoa Drops another year, sweet little jam-filled things another, bar cookies another, and I seem to recall that my one and only Christmas cookies last year were these buttery drop cookies, a recipe I can't even remember what cookbook I found them in.

I would have linked those cutout recipes I haven't tried yet so you could beat me to it. But most of what I have in my old and semi-old Better Homes, Betty Crocker and Sunset cookbooks aren't on those particular company's websites. So I'm not sure which of the universe of other websites has the best recipes.

However, this is a very close link to my old Betty Crocker favorite, Cocoa Drop cookies .  This link takes you instead to Betty Crocker's recipe for Chocolate Drop cookies. It's a very similar recipe, but in my cookbook, there is the option to use 1/2 cup of cocoa and 2/3 cup margarine instead of 2 oz. of unsweetened chocolate and only 1/2 cup of margarine. I also make the frosting that comes with this recipe, but tint it with food coloring instead of adding chocolate. This allows me to have bright green and red for Christmas, or other colors the rest of the year.


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