Stamped, Homemade Peanut Butter Cookies

I made cookies this weekend, which I haven’t done in forever.

Something put me in the mood and I was eager to try out this new home made cookie stamp that I ordered from Amazon.

The minute I saw it I thought of the care packages I could send to my youngest when he goes away to college this fall.

Actually, it’s not this fall at all. It’s in less than six weeks. As in next month. Sigh.

Anyway, I wanted to give the cookie stamp a trial run and I wasn’t disappointed.

I made the balls of cookie dough a little bigger than I normally do (not a bad thing), thinking they would need to be bigger in order to get flat enough for the stamp.

It turns out that wasn’t really necessary; a regular amount of cookie dough will do.

I also dipped the stamp in sugar until it was liberally covered (also not a bad thing) before I stamped each cookie. That worked well; the stamp didn’t stick at all.

My go-to peanut butter cookie recipe comes from this book.

I ordered it as part of a grade school Scholastic book order. In 1973.

I still have it and I still bake from it 41 years later. I can’t tell you how old typing that just made me feel.

Here’s the recipe, if you’re interested:

Peanut Butter Cookies

• 1/2 cup butter or other soft shortening
• 1/2 cup smooth peanut butter
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

Cream the shortening, peanut butter, and both sugars together. Add the egg and vanilla. Measure the flour, salt and baking soda into another bowl, add to the peanut butter batter and stir.

Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Makes approx. 20 cookies.

The actual instructions in the book (which were written for children) say to break the egg into a cup before mixing it in the bowl. Does anyone do that anymore?

Maybe, maybe not, but I can report that a 1973 recipe still makes a mean peanut butter cookie in 2014.