In case you were wondering this is a spooky ghost cookie. My mom made them for me for Halloween because, try as I might, I cannot get the dough right. The recipe for this cookie dough is Alberts-ian cooking arcana. My Mom learned from my great-grandmother who also learned from her great-grandmother and god knows where she learned it from, Bandaloops for all I know. It is one of those recipes that anyone can attempt but only some can master. My aunts (mom's sisters) have all tried for years to get it right and it never compares. The trick is in the amount of flour that is added in total. You have to add enough flour to make the dough workable, then you must knead it in a particular way, all the while adding more and more flour until it feels and acts right. Yes, you read that right, it has to act right. There in lies the mystery. It took my mom years to get it right. I have the same trouble as she did; in the beginning your cookies are bricks because you added too much flour. No one likes bricks, not even thick sugary ones. They can take any shape. This time around she made me ghosts and pumpkins. Come X-mas, reindeer and bells and stars will begin showing up. On occasion she will make me donkey shaped cookies, my favorite. There may even be some snowmen, complete with raisin buttons, raisins being the decoration of choice for buttons or eyes or whatever else. These ghosts have chocolate chip eyes though because when it come to eyes everyone knows that chocolate chips are spookier than raisins.
On to other news. This weekend is shaping up decently. Jon is coming by on Saturday, as is Joe, in the hopes that we might catch the new Cohen brothers flick. No Country for Old Men....looks killer, no pun intended. After that who knows. It's quite likely that the evening will gradually dissolve into beers and silliness. I will probably spend Sunday beginning to "thin the herd" that is my domestic clutter. I'll find out tomorrow if I am moving after the first of the year. I'd give it 90 percent odds in favor that I am. So in the likely event that I am moving I will need to grab some boxes and start thinking about packing some things away. I might actually start making preparations to take some photos of people as well. A well organized photo album is clutch when you are away from home. At least in my opinion.
Music: "Late in the Evening" - Paul Simon
2 comments:
Aaarrrrgh!!!! I love those cookies! I tried 5 or 6 times one winter to get them right and never managed it.
Have fun this weekend with the boys. I miss you guys.
My family has a very similar tradition with sugar cookies, and just the same, no one can make them as well as my great aunt.
By the way, I'd have to say pre-meds are even worse than science majors.
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