Cheery And Cheer: That Day In Pictures - Cookies and Milk Reception (and a recipe)

Sunday, December 14, 2014

That Day In Pictures - Cookies and Milk Reception (and a recipe)

Exactly one year ago today, my daughter Gabe and her husband Mark were married. The ceremony was in the LDS Temple in Belmont (Boston) Massachusetts, and their reception was in our home here in NH. Gabe had specifically asked for a Cookies and Milk reception, just cookies, no other food - I wasn't surprised at her request, after all, her first word was "cookie".

She's even in the spice cabinet - we're probably getting ready to make cookies!

And of course, I was to bake them all because I am her mom, and there should be 25 kinds or more since that's all we were going to feed people, and milk, and perhaps fresh fruited water for non-milk drinkers. Let me see, 25 kinds of cookies and about 100 of each kind, 10 cookies for each person, better make 3000 just in case. No problem. Really, I was thrilled with her request. I.Love.To.Bake. Gabe mentioned a few kinds that I just had to make but the rest of the list was up to me and choosing cookie recipes was so much fun! Heady hours spent pouring over cook books! So starting last December 1st of 2013, I made several different batches of cookie dough each day and froze them. Then, about four days before the wedding, I baked from morning until late evening and then carefully packed and froze each batch. We bought out all the plastic food storage pieces at the local Walmart so we could do this. I'm not exaggerating. I am set for "tupperware" for the rest of my life. 30 kinds, 100 each give or take, about 3000 cookies total. The day before the wedding, I frosted/filled the ones that required it and stored them carefully. It was all a blast. I enjoyed every minute and the reception was lovely, sweet, fun and delicious. My husband typed up all the recipes I used; some were family favorites tried and true, many I'd never made before. And all with butter, except the macaroons - we bought an incredible amount of butter! He compiled the recipes and we made an e cookie booklet for Gabe (and for all of our girls just for fun). Here's what it looked like.

Friends Kris and Joanne are preparing the beverage table in the back there.

Daughter/Step daughter Brittany in her cute braids was our photographer

No sweat.

There was a cake too! Double Chocolate Peanut Butter. The same I made for my own wedding.

There were plenty of leftovers in spite of the many guests. It was so fun to watch expressions on people's faces when they came in and saw the piles of cookies. Who doesn't love cookies and want to eat a plateful? The leftover ones were carefully repacked and frozen and were then given away on Christmas goodie plates to friends and neighbors and we kept a few of our own favorites in the "fun freezer".

Happy 1st Anniversary Gabe and Mark!!! I hope you ate some cookies.

Here is a delicious cookie recipe. This is one of my kids' favorites and I make it every Christmas and several times in the fall around Halloween. And it was on the cookie table at the wedding reception. It's perfectly chewy, crunchy, spicy. And it's really easy because you throw all the ingredients in together.

Fat Gingersnaps
2 1/4 cups of flour
1 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup melted unsalted butter
1/4 cup molasses
1 egg
1 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
1 t ginger
1 t cinnamon
1/2 t ground cloves

sugar for rolling the cookies

Put 1 1/4 cups of the flour in your mixing bowl, add everything else and beat on medium high until throughly blended. Add the remaining cup of flour and mix until just combined. Roll dough into 1 inch balls, roll in sugar (I like to combine white sugar with the coarse deremera sugar for extra crunch), place balls 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake at 350 for 9 - 11 minutes. They should crackle a bit when they are done.

As you can see, this page has been used a lot! And I changed that shortening to butter - I don't ever use shortening - Butter tastes better, always, and melted butter can be used in place of oil as well.