 |
| The Irish twins celebrating together. |
When my brother and I were growing up at times we celebrated our birthdays togther. It was easier for our parents, since we were a year apart. To some we are Irish twins.
In the late sixties we moved into the house where we grew up. I am not sure of the year 1969 or 1970 my parents threw us a joint birthday party. There must have been 20 or so kids running around the house all jacked up on sugar and ice cream. There were kids climbing on the wrought iron work that we had in the house. It was the sixties after all. It scared my mom to death, and I’m sure that if there was any one incident to drive parents to drink this was it. This was the last party my brother and I had together.
The one gift I remember was from my neighbor across the street. I parted with it long ago, but never fear tracked it down through a rare book seller. It was my very first cookbook. The recipes were very simple. In fact the mac & cheese recipe is the one from the blue box. But I remember the oatmeal raisin cookies as the best ever. I made a lot of them, beside Snickerdoodle cookies these were my favorite.
After all these years did my memory fail me? Were these cookies as good as I remember? Yes, to the memory and yes to taste. They were good and chewy. Although they were small in size they were tasty. Maybe to a kid cookies look bigger then they do when you’re are all grown up.
Happy Birthday to my brother!
 |
| My very first cookbook |
 |
| Move in day. That’s the famous wrought iron work |
 |
| All the ingredients ready to go |
 |
| The mixer hard at work mixing in the oats |
 |
| One of my favorites growing up.
Raisin Oatmeal Cookies adapted from the Better Homes and Garden Junior Cookbook for the Hostess & Host of tomorrow.
INGREDIENTS: 1 cup of all purpose flour 1/2 cup of brown sugar 1/4 cup of granulated sugar 2 tbs of milk 2 cups of quick cooking rolled oats 1 egg 1 cup raisins 1/2 tsp of baking soda 1/2 tsp of salt 1tsp of cinnamon 1/2 cup of shortening*
*I used unsalted butter, I could not bring myself to use the shorting.
1. Set oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease cooky (yes, that is how they spelled it in the book) sheets with a little bit of shortening. Or line the cooky sheets with parchment paper. Measure out the flour onto paper. Add the soda, salt, and cinnamon and sift ingredients together. 2. Add shortening or butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar, egg, and milk: mix well. Beat mixture by hand: 100 times. Ok, I admit I used the mixer for this part. So soften the butter and sugars for about three minutes on a low speed. 3. Add raisins and oats. Drop the teaspoons of cooky mixture 2 inches apart on to the lined cooky sheets and bake. 4. Bake 12 to 15 minutes. Remove cookies from the sheets with a turner Place them on a rack to cool. Store in jar. Yup that’s it but there is one thing missing. What about the dry ingredients when do you add those. Well, it turns out that step is missing so I added it after step 2 and before step 3.
|