Spring is coming... Spring is Coming.... Spring is coming??

I am impatient... antsy....anxious...ready for spring....ready for green grass to mow....garden to plant....flower beds to weed...

THE PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES

This is one of the first cookies I learned to bake.

The good ol', all American peanut butter cookie!

I remember the anticipation while waiting, as Mom rolled the little balls of cookie dough between her hands and placed it on the cookie sheet.

I couldn't wait to take a fork and press the crisscross pattern in the cookie. This design makes peanut butter cookies distinctive and the cookie can be identified by sight from across the kitchen!

I have tried several recipes, but I have found that time and again this simple set of ingredients make a great cookie and that after 50 or 60 years of untold batches baked, this recipe has withstood the test of taste and time.

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 cup white sugar

1 cup shortening (I use butter flavored Crisco)

2 eggs

1 cup peanut butter (I use Jif)

2 1/2 cups all purpose four

1 teaspoon soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/4 cup granulated sugar

Cream together brown sugar, white sugar, shortening. Add eggs separately beating well after each addition. Add vanilla. Add peanut butter and blend well.

Measure flour into a separate bowl. Add soda and salt and sift once to blend.

Add by spoonfuls to the wet batter, mixing well after each addition.

With about a tablespoon of dough, roll into a ball and place on cookie sheet. With a fork dampened with water, dip into 1/4 cup of sugar and press into cookie, making a crisscross pattern. Bake 9-11 minutes. Don't over bake! You want this cookie crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside!

Cool on a cookie sheet or get yourself a tall glass of milk and dunk away while still warm!

COLLECTED MEMORIES

There are times when I pull the old worn recipe box off the shelf and thumb through the various notes and recipe cards, choose what I want to bake and be on with my day.

Then there are days, like today, when it is cold, with snow covering the ground and the skys are steel grey, when nostalgia overtakes me and each recipe I pick up and read, brings back misty memories of baking and cooking at my Mother's side.

The Sugar Cookie Recipe she used all the time, simply listed the ingredients with no directions. The amounts overlapped each other on a no-line recipe card, the ink so faded out there were places on the card that could barely be read.

The first time I baked them I miss read the amounts of one ingredient and the cookies where so fragile they went "POOF" when you bit them! The look on my husband's face was priceless! The cookie simply disintegrated! I can see my Mom laughing as if she were beside me in the kitchen!

Her Pie Crust recipe and her Peanut Butter Cookie will never be substituted in my kitchen. These recipes are like a trusted friends, well received and counted on time after time.

I have kept the original scraps of paper and cards. I love the stains, creases, and scribbled notes. The handwritting is as familiar as the methods of cooking and baking. To re-write them on crisp clean cutesy recipe cards would somehow deface the integrity of her way in the kitchen. I just can't imagine her cakes would taste the same mixed and baked from anything but that time worn recipe.

Supreme Hot Cocoa Mix

This recipe was developed out of a simple need. On cold days when I have my four active grandsons outside playing and they need something hot to warm them up, the little packages of cocoa mix just were too expensive, and came up short on flavor.

I researched many recipes and tryed a number combinations with disappointing results.

This recipe is a culmination of a winter worth of experiments. It has been given a thumbs up by family members and is requested often.

Hot Cocoa Supreme

2 cups dry milk

3/4 to 1 cup white sugar

3/4 cup non-dairy creamer

1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa

2.5 ounce package instant chocolate pudding mix

Blend all together in a large bowl

This will fit into a quart jar.

Add 1/3 to 1/2 cup to 10 ounces boiling water.

Stir to mix and enjoy!