This recipe is the most requested cookie I make. My husband loves them, boy scouts swoon over these cookies, and I have even been requested to make them for a wedding dessert table!  The recipe is one from Good Housekeeping’s Holiday Cheer magazine put out in 2010. This recipe makes about 6-dozen. Enjoy!

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

1 cup butter (2 sticks), softened (no substitutions)

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 cup plus 2 Tbsp. granulated sugar

1 tsp. vanilla extract

2 large eggs

1 jar (18 oz.) creamy peanut butter

Preheat oven to 350°. Into a large bowl sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

  1. In your mixing bowl cream butter, brown sugar and 1 cup of the granulated sugar. Reduce speed of your mixer to low and beat in vanilla, then eggs (one at a time). Once batter is smooth add the peanut butter and beat until batter is creamy. Reduce speed of your mixer as low as possible and start adding the flour, a few heaping tablespoons at a time until all incorporated and batter is stiff. Make sure you scrape the bowl as you are going along to make sure that all the flour gets into the dough.
  2. Get your cookie pan(s) out and prepped. Put the additional two tablespoons of sugar into a shallow dish. Have a kitchen tablespoon and a fork ready!
  3. Scoop out dough by a rounded tablespoon and roll it lightly in your hands and place it on the cookie sheet. Dip the tines of the fork in the granulated sugar and then press lightly into the dough ball first one way and then the other to create a crosshatch pattern. Space cookie about 2 inches apart.
  4. Bake cookies 12 minutes or until lightly browned at the edges. After the first batch you might want to adjust your cooking time to your particular taste in crispness. Once you bring cookies out of the over allow them to rest on the sheet for 5 minutes and then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.
  5. To store cookies choose an airtight container or zip lock. They freeze beautifully.

Denise Hitchcock