Click the photo, you can go buy your own copy of this classic from Amazon.com

Growing up, I remember baking with Mom quite a bit.  And I remember one Christmas baking with my Grandma Smeigh, and I specifically remember baking Candy Cane shaped cookies, where you colored the dough red, and then braided two strips of dough to make the candy cane shape.  If I recall correctly, the cookies didn’t really taste all that great, but they sure looked cool.

Mom had a Betty Crocker Cooky Book that was well used when I was growing up.I think maybe that’s where the candy cane recipe came from?  I can’t remember what has happened to the book, do you still have it, Mom?  Is it falling apart, or am I making that up?

These days, most of my cookie making consists of pulling frozen lumps of dough out of the freezer and baking it.  It’s stuff that we bought from the school fundraiser.  They are surprisingly good, but of course, not nearly as good as REAL cookies.

Several weeks ago, a member of the local youth group asked me if I wanted some cookie dough, they were selling some as a fundraiser.  I didn’t really need any, but then I found out that they had peanut butter dough — the school fundraiser didn’t have any this year, so I was all over a bulk order or peanut butter cookie dough.  Based on my school fundraiser experience, I had certain expectations for what my dough might look like — I knew they weren’t selling me pre-formed lumps, but I thought it was at least frozen.  And I assumed they were doing it through a company.

Imagine my surprise when this showed up yesterday:

After it showed up, I remembered hearing one of the dads talking about having to make cookie dough, it didn’t occur to me that him making dough and the fundraiser were actually the same thing.  It doesn’t exactly look appetizing in a plastic bag like this, but I figured I had to go ahead and use this right away, so:

Yes, they taste as good as they look.  Better, even.

I also made half the cookies as Peanut Butter Blossoms, which are my All Time Favorite Cookie Ever.

These aren’t quite perfect, though:

1. I think I baked them a smidge too long.
2. I made the balls of dough a hair too big:  the ratio of cookie to Kiss isn’t quite right.
3. I also realized after the fact that these should have been rolled in granulated sugar just like the regular peanut butter cookies.

Not that they are inedible.  Far from it.  The next batch will just be that much better.

And as you could see, I Have plenty of cookie dough with which to experiment.

Also, I will need to run a few more miles on the treadmill.