There
are these cookies that I love, and I don't mean the kind of love that
I'd take these over an oreo. I mean the kind of love where I'd shank
a baby with a rusy spork for the last crumbs in the bottom of the
cookie jar kind of love! I remember sitting on the table as a toddler
“helping” my grandma make these. After my grandma died, my mom
would make them for me. I would ask her to make these cookies for me
instead of a birthday cake. Mom always considered them “special
occasion” cookies, and unless she tired of my endless begging, she
would normally only make them at Christmas. She would also make them
for our church's holiday bazaar and bake sale. When I got old enough
I would stand in line before the church would open, so that I could
be first in line, and I would buy all that she had made.
To be
honest, these aren't really that special. They are a cashew cookie,
made with brown sugar and sour cream, not very sweet, but they have a
browned butter frosting on them, and if you put browned butter on a
used tire I would probably ask for seconds. They are a little fussy,
but not very hard to make. Sort of. Once you get the cosmic blessing.
Full
disclosure: I'm a pretty good cook. Not much intimidates me in the
kitchen. I learned to cook from women who didn't have recipe books,
so if you ask me for a recipe, I am likely to tell you to come over,
and I will show you how to make it. I do this because not a lot of my
own recipes are written down. If I tried to give you a recipe it
would likely be something like, “Cook until it just about boils,
but doesn't.” “Add flour until it sticks together, but isn't
sticky.” “Cook in a hot oven until it's done.” Really helpful,
isn't it? Sorry. But, here's the thing; I couldn't make these
cookies! Starting as a teenager, I tried countless times to make
these. Mom wrote out, step by step, how to make them. When that
didn't work, she stood right next to me, trying to walk me through
it. Didn't help. All I got were nasty light brown hockey pucks, or
one giant cookie that spread to cover the entire cookie sheet.
I gave
up, and continued to beg mom to make them for me. She did, and
eventually expanded to making them for several friends for their
birthdays, too. Then 9 years ago, this Christmas, Mom died and
couldn't make any more cashew cookies for me. I was talking to a
friend the following spring, who had a birthday coming up, and she
said, “I know this sounds horrible and selfish, but I can't help
being really sad that I won't get any of your mom's cashew cookies
this year.”
I tried
one more time to make the cookies, and you know what? They turned out
perfect! Seriously! I don't know what I did different, but every time
I've tried to make them since, they have turned out exactly as they
should. Until last week.
I had
made these last year for someone, who I knew would love them, and she
did. Then we had quite a falling out, and the nicest way I can think
to put it is, if she were on fire, and I had a cup of water, I'd be
sad it wasn't gasoline. Actually, I've pretty much refused to let her
name cross my lips, and now just refer to her as the hosebeast. One
of hosebeast's relatives emailed me and said hosebeast had been
having a hard time, and the relative remembered how much she liked
the cashew cookies, so asked if I would send her the recipe so she
could make some to cheer her up. Umm... HELL NO! But, because I don't
like confrontation, I emailed back and said I had lost the recipe.
Then I went to the store and bought all the ingredients to make me a
big old batch of spite cookies!
This is
where it gets weird. In the 9 years since I have been able to make
the cookies, they have never been anything less than cashewy, browned
butter perfection. Last week I tried to make them on two different
days. The first time I got the scaling wrong, and only used half the
amount of flour that I should have. After buying another $10 in
cashews, batch number 2 looked to be a success, until they came out
of the oven looking like baking powder biscuits on steroids. I gave
up.
Yesterday
the fireman brought me a big can of cashews, and said I needed to
make the cookies. I tried to tell him, that I couldn't, that
apparently I had lost the cosmic cookie gift. He gave me that look,
like he is about to ask where I've hidden my crack pipe, but then he
said, “They'll turn out this time. It's almost your birthday. Now
they are birthday cookies and not spite cookies.”
I just
finished frosting them, and they turned out perfect. Apparently they
can only be made with love, and not spite. Damn crazy cookie ghosts!
Just
another quick note on the crazy way I learned to cook. I do have a
recipe for these that mom wrote out for me (and if anyone wants it,
as long as I don't also want to set you on fire, I'm happy to share).
Where a normal recipe would say, make teaspoon size, or make 1 ½
inch cookies, mom's recipe says, make lady sized cookies. There were
two sizes of cookies growing up, lady sized and man sized. Lady sized
cookies were usually “fancy” and appropriate for a ladies lunch
or serving at a funeral, about walnut sized. Man sized cookies are
the non-fancy cookies that were always in the cookie jar. Think
oatmeal raisin, snickerdoodle and chocolate chip. The appropriate
size for man-sized cookies were the size that perfectly matched dad
or grandpa's shirt pocket.
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