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The best cookie cookbooks out there
By Times staff writer
© St. Petersburg Times,
published December 12, 2001
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 Cookie recipes
Christmas cookies: The social circle
Baking cookies is a passion for one group of women who for 17 years have met each December for a holiday cookie swap.
How to organize a cookie exchange
It may be too late to organize a Christmas cookie swap before Christmas this year, but there's always next year. Selma Robinson-Ayers, a 17-year cookie exchange veteran, offers these tips for planning the event:
The best cookie cookbooks out there
There are many cookie cookbooks on the market that are equally as helpful for their recipes and tips as they are for their photographic inspiration. |
There are many cookie cookbooks on the market that are equally as helpful for their recipes and tips as they are for their photographic inspiration.
Once you see the Sugar Cookie Carolers in Meredith Books' Cookies for Christmas, you have to make them. Their curly icing hair and green hats are irresistible.
At this time of year, many large booksellers stock cookie cookbooks. However, not every title in circulation will be on their shelves. Bookstores can order the books for you or if you shop online, www.amazon.com is your best best. Be warned, though, these books are in high demand this time of year.
The best cookie books out there:
- Cookies for Christmas edited by Jennifer Dorland Darling (Meredith Books, 1999, $24.95) is from the folks in the test kitchens of Better Homes and Gardens magazine, so you know the recipes are good. The variety of recipes for cutouts, bar cookies, Old World favorites and a multitude of tips make this a classic cookie book. Each recipe is accompanied by a color photo.
- Cookies for Dummies edited by Carole Bloom (Hungry Minds, 2001, $19.99) is yet another in the series of how-to books simply written. Lots of wonderful tips and drawings illustrate techniques. There are just a few pictures but easy-to-follow directions.
- The All-American Cookie Book by Nancy Baggett (Houghton Mifflin, 2001, $35) is worth the high price tag if you make cookies a lot. This is a beautiful cookbook with well-researched and tested recipes. Baggett is a veteran cookbook author, and her articles have appeared in Gourmet, Food & Wine, Bon Appetit and Ladies' Home Journal.
- Rose's Christmas Cookies by Rose Levy Beranbaum (William Morrow, 1990, $28) is a collection of 60 holiday favorites by the author of the award-winning The Cake Bible. If you're looking for recipes and instructions for Christmas favorites such as Scottish shortbread, Mexican wedding cakes, spritz butter cookies, springerle and pfeffernusse, you'll find them there.
- The Christmas Cookie Book by Lou Seibert Pappas (Chronicle Books, 2001, $14.95) offers both the history of traditional Christmas cookies and the best way to wrap them for shipping. It contains 40 recipes and lots of photos.
- Family Fun's Cookies for Christmas edited by Deanna F. Cook (Hyperion, 1998, $9.95) has all the kid-friendly charm of Family Fun magazine. The collection of 75 recipes is broken down into parts for adults and parts for kids. This is an easy introduction to baking for children.
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