Recipes

It occurs to me that I never gave the recipe for my peanutbutter kiss cookies that vanished so quickly at the picnic. It's a really easy recipe, and the cookies come out perfectly pretty much every time, which is always a bonus! Here goes:

Peanut Blossoms

(this is my mom's name for these cookies--whether it's because they vaguely resemble small brown flowers, or because she was trying to avoid the trademarked "kiss" name, I'm not sure)

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 shortening

1/2 cup peanut butter (creamy works best)

1 egg

2 TB milk

1 tsp vanilla

1 3/4 cup flour

40-60 Hershey's Kisses (tm), unwrapped, and set aside.*

Additional granulated sugar, set aside in a small bowl with high sides.

Pre-heat oven to 375F. In a large bowl combine sugars, soda, salt, shortening, peanut butter, egg, milk, and vanilla. Cream well, till there aren't any lumps. You can use a mixer, or bash the lumps with a wooden spoon. Once you don't see any more lumps, start adding the flour in small increments, stirring well to incorporate. Once the mixture is well-combined, begin shaping the dough into small 1/2 inch balls, rolling them between your palms to make them nice and round. Drop several balls at a time into the bowl of reserved sugar, gently shaking the bowl till balls are covered on all sides.

Place the sugared balls at least one inch apart on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake on center rack of pre-heated oven at 375 degrees F, until firm, but not hard, about 10 minutes. Set cookie sheet on a heatproof surface next to your kisses, and immediately top each cookie with a kiss. Press down gently but firmly.

Let them cool on the pan for a minute or two, then remove them to a wire rack to cool all the way. Once cooled carefully place them in a large airtight container, so that the kisses of one cookie don't stick to any other cookies. They keep best in the fridge, up to ten days, but are served best at room temperature, so that the kisses are soft while eating!

*I get about sixty cookies out of this recipe, my mom gets about forty. It all depends on your philosophy of the peanut butter to chocolate ratio. I like them more chocolatey and less peanut buttery, so I make smaller cookies, but you could easily just make fewer, larger cookies, and have a bigger circle of peanut butter around each kiss. If you get sixty cookies, each cookie will have 130 calories.