Photography By Donovan Roberts Witmer
Roll up your sleeves and turn your ovens on; holiday cookie season is right around the corner! We asked our readers about your favorite family baking traditions, and we found these heartwarming stories and mouthwatering recipes.
Jenni’s blackberry Sage Thumbprints
2 cups unbleached flour 2/3 cup yellow cornmeal 3 tsp chopped fresh sage, or 1-1 1/2 tsp dried sage (save a few fresh leaves to garnish, if desired) 1/4 tsp baking powder 1 cup softened butter 1 cup brown sugar 2 eggs 2 tsp organic lemon zest 1 1/2 tsp fair trade vanilla 1/3 cup blackberry preserves
Combine flour, cornmeal, sage and baking powder. Beat butter until fluffy. Add brown sugar to butter and beat until creamy. Beat in eggs, lemon zest and vanilla. Mix in the flour mixture. Shape dough into ¾ inch balls. Place balls one inch apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Lightly press the ball with the tip of your thumb, making a slight indentation. Fill each center with about ¼ teaspoon preserves. Bake in 350 degree oven for 10-12 minutes or until lightly brown. Cool and garnish with small sage leaves, if desired.
“We’ve been doing a cookie bake for years at our house, 10-plus years in a formal way... but informally, cookie bakes have been going on for at least 20 years! We love our annual cookie bake for the stories, the fellowship, the friends, and the traditions we pass along, as well as [sharing] the memories of those who are no longer with us through [their] cookies.” - Jenni Leister, Ephrata
See the Houser Family Rosemary Cookies for another recipe from Jenni's annual cookie bake cookbook.
Note from Jenni: I tend to use whatever preserves are fresh from my season’s canning. I have made this recipe with raspberry jam as well as apricot jam. Both are equally as luscious as the blackberry. I also enjoy substituting lime zest for the lemon. Lime is awesome with apricot jam!
Alyson’s Pennsylvania Dutch Sour Cream Cookies
2 cups flour 1 cup sugar 3/4 cup butter 1 tsp salt 1 tsp baking soda 1 tsp vanilla 1 egg 8 oz sour cream
Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add vanilla, then beat in egg. Mix sour cream and baking soda in a separate bowl until the mixture bubbles up. Mix flour and salt in another bowl. Add flour mixture alternately with sour cream mixture in thirds. Mix to form a soft ball, then add some extra flour to make the ball slightly less sticky. (Alyson: Not too much flour!) Chill in plastic wrap for about an hour. Remove from fridge, then roll out to about a ¼ inch thickness and cut out with festive cookie cutters. Cookies should be on the thick side. Place on cookie sheet and bake in 350 degree oven for 9 minutes or until lightly brown. (Alyson: The lighter the better.) When cooled, frost with buttercream icing and sprinkle with colored sugar.
“Our Sour Cream Cookie (a fluffy, dense and cake-like cookie with a marvelous vanilla flavor) has been handed down from my great great grandmother Amelia Gebauer Blank to my great grandmother Zenta Blank Cochenet (Nanny) to my mother Margo Jones Pomeroy. When my mom asked Nanny for the recipe she did not have any measurements for it. She just added a pinch of this and that to a scoop of this and that to a splash of this and that, probably just as her mother did, and always came up with these cookies. One day my Mom went to her house and asked her to make them and let her measure the ingredients and this is the recipe we use today. Nanny made them mainly at Christmas, hiding them from everyone until Christmas Eve.” - Alyson McClelland, Lancaster
Note from Alyson: I use a combination of confectioners sugar, melted butter and vanilla for my frosting, then add some whipped topping to the frosting to make it extra fluffy. Trust me! See page 19 for more information on Alyson's food blog.
Houser Family Rosemary Cookies
1 cup softened butter 1 1/2 cup sugar 2 eggs 2 3/4 cup flour 2 tsp cream of tartar 1 tsp baking soda 1/4 tsp salt 2 1/2 tsp fresh chopped rosemary
Cream together butter, sugar and eggs until smooth. Stir in flour, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt. Add rosemary and mix well. Roll dough into small balls and place on cookie sheets covered with parchment paper. Bake in 350 degree oven for 10 minutes. Sprinkle with sugar and enjoy!
This recipe comes from Jenni’s cookie bake guests Ted and Patricia. Ted Houser is a native of Lancaster County and he and his wife Patricia have brought them to the cookie bake several years in a row because they are so delicious! They usually grab the fresh rosemary from his sister’s bush in Washington, DC.
