Baking Memories

K and I decided one day last weekend to bake cookies. And what a grand decision that was. It always is. We followed (generally) our family recipe accurately and affectionately entitled “Grandma Jo’s Sugar Cookies”.
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Grandma Jo’s Sugar Cookies

1 cup butter
2 eggs
1 cup powdered sugar
1 cup white sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/3 tsp salt
1/4 cup cooking oil
2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp cream of tarter
4 ½ cups unsifted flour

Mix butter, oil and sugars.
Beat in eggs and add vanilla.
Sift dry ingredients together and add to mixture.
Refrigerate dough for no more than 45-50 minutes.
Roll out and cut with cookie cutters.
(Sprinkle flour onto counter top to prevent dough from sticking to counter).
Place on ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes at 350 degrees.
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I’m not sure if there is anything unique about this recipe but it was the one my Mother used and as current baking endeavors ensue they always conger up fond memories and familiar aromas from the respective childhoods of me and my children. And in recent years this has become the recipe of my wife Denise whose cookie making prowess commands the attention of every cookie eating friend and relative that I know. And now, the natural progression of things has obliged our daughters to assume their inherent roles as keepers of our family’s cookie knowledge treasures.

In my opinion, and I’m absolutely certain of this, being skillful at baking has little to do with the physical act of baking. No, the three key ingredients that combine to make a good baker are patience, imagination and ingenuity. After that the second tier of prerequisite attributes would probably be a working knowledge of math, a keen sensibility toward the organization of future thoughts and movements and a rather large and well defined sense of space. Of third tier importance is the possession of tools and supplies with which to bake, an ample supply of willing consumers of baked goods and of course a partner who enjoys cleaning up while you continue to perpetuate the motion of substantive ingredient transformation. Notably absent from this grab bag of baking skills is beer drinking. I’m certain that this is why steaks are grilled and quiche is baked. After all, beer drinking is the first skill of grilling, right before firefighting. But I digress…

Possessing all three tier one attributes in great abundance, K is a natural baker. I’m a bit of a reluctant baker, patience being my weakness. But I thrive on interaction with my family. It is my fuel. No, it’s beyond mere fuel. My family time acts more like a synergy together with my eager spirit – the combined effect being much greater than the simple sum of the individual effects.

Baking cookies consists of three main parts – mixing of stuff, flattening and cutting of stuff and heating of stuff. After the cookies are baked comes the good stuff – decorating and devouring.

The mixing of various ingredients in proper proportions to create usable dough is the most arduous task involved in the cookie baking process. It’s brutal. The task involves much cracking and sifting and beating. It is also where most of the math is involved…“Let’s see, if one batch requires 1-1/2 cups and we are making two batches but Grandma Jo always adds a bit extra but since we mistakenly used 1-1/2 teaspoon in lieu of 1-1/4 teaspoon of….”.

For our mixing stage K measured sugars and flour, I cracked eggs, we sifted the mixture and then we mixed and we mixed and we mixed. Then we subjected our mixture to a bit of "relaxation" in the refrigerator. However, lacking proper fortification we contrived a makeshift security measure lest our booty of cookie dough be pillaged whilst we rested from all of our incessant mixing.

Proper flattening of dough requires more skill than is readily apparent to the casual observer. And the actual flatness is the least of the worries. The sticking and breaking of dough are troublesome but are controlled through careful steadiness and tricks of the trade, here-to-fore unknown to non-bakers like myself, such as flouring the surface below the dough and sugaring the ever flattening top. And during the flattening proceedure, maintenance of a uniform thinness is paramount.

Since flattening is where most of the patience comes into play, K was our designated flattener. K skillfully rolled and flattened the doughy mound into a uniformly thinned disk that validated her deftness of patience.

Through much negotiation we settled upon a seemingly random scattering of chosen cookie shapes -big stars, little stars, clovers, hearts, dog bones and Space Needles. We rejected such shapes as witches, snow men, bunnies, pine trees, circles, turkeys, snowflakes and pumpkins. Armed with the agreed upon shapes and subsequent to K’s artful flattening, I assumed the role of the cutter. Cutting fits me because I like efficiencies. I enjoy combining various orientations of shapes and sizes to maximize the cookieness of the flattened dough and to minimize the scraps between cookies. I find this task to be oddly sporting. Never mind the fact that these carefully hewn remnants betwixt cookies are easily collected and recycled into the next flattened mass thus rendering the efficiency of my cuts meaningless.

And so we operated as a team - K flattened and I cut. Then we wadded up the scraps, added more dough and K flattened and I cut some more. We repeated these actions several times until we had exhausted all of our doughy resources.

Next came the baking. Again, this is the simple mindless part. Sure you’ve got to calculate the proper time and temperature of baking but these are more a function of the flattening process…thin cookies cook faster than thick ones. The only real difficulty in baking is to not forget to stop baking. Don’t leave them in too long. You need to take them out of the oven before they are fully cooked as they will continue to cook somewhat while they cool on the pan.

Surprisingly, our favorite part of cookie making is not the final “devouring” stage. K and I find the decorating to be particularly stimulating. It is a creative outlet. We enjoy smearing and troweling and splattering on frosting in various colors to create abstract works of art. Well, it’s actually more of an abstract mess but who’s to complain? All of the would-be complainers have their jowls too full of cookie to offer any discernable criticism.

Having spent several hours together on a common task with much conversation and laughter, we felt fulfilled. We made some great memories and at the end of the day we ate cookies. And they were good.