I made "Christmas" cookies this morning, the only thing Christmas-y about them being it's a week before Christmas. And when I say "made" I presume it goes without saying that means I broke up the little squares of refrigerated dough I mandated my husband buy at the store, heated up the oven and threw them in. As I broke up the little squares I marveled at modern conveniences and wondered aloud who in their right mind makes cookies from scratch anymore.
Fifteen minutes later I was less sure. The edges of the sugar cookies were getting "lightly browned" like the directions said, but there was still a bothersome square at the top of the cookie. While I appreciate the squareness in the dough form, shouldn't the end cookie product be round? You don't have to be Julia Child to know a cookie looks funny.
So do I let them burn slightly, hoping the square hump dissipates or do I take them out -- as the directions dictate -- when the edges are slightly brown? It would be helpful if Nestle put a little note in parentheses saying: "Don't let the big square bumps deter you! That's normal!" I opted to let them brown a few more minutes as I watched intently through the oven door. The edges kept getting browner but the square did nothing. Now I'm getting pissed. Because I'm thinking I: a) can't pass these off as homemade and b) may have to run out to the store to purchase canned icing to hide the square top.
I opted to c) do neither and still tell people I made them, silently daring them to challenge me.
Besides, I really only made them so the girls can leave some for Santa. I think leaving Santa store-bought cookies might send a conflicting message about Santa's importance. If I'm going to threaten them all year with being good, the person who is capable of squashing their dreams deserves a homemade treat when he comes through on his end of the bargain I would imagine.
See, these are the little nuances nobody tells you about motherhood. Making decisions like whether it's okay to serve fat-free fig newtons to an imaginary fat guy or whether you should pull out all the stops and throw some deformed cookie dough in the oven. In the end, I would guess Santa would rather some figure-trimming yet still delicious fig newtons over slightly burnt and oddly shaped sugar cookies. Maybe we'll leave both and see what Santa chooses.
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If someone challenges you, remind them that Wendy's hamburgers are square and they're ok.
ReplyDeleteThat is totally freaky. And creepy.
ReplyDeleteBut I'd eat them anyhow.
Sure they'll last until Christmas?
I've had this same thing happen to me with those type of cookies. You can roll the dough into a ball shape before you bake them, but that takes extra effort. I say icing. It will look even more homemade effort like then!
ReplyDeleteI'm so confused that I read it as "throw some deformed cookie dung in the oven." After that, your cookies looked extremely homemade and appetizing.
ReplyDeleteJust invent a long story about how hard it was to get homemade cookies to have that square on the top and how it's symbolic of something or other Christmas-related.
I think Pillsbury has some explaining to do. I bought the slice and bake cookie dough, and I thought the cookies would come out round since I cut them from a cylindar shaped log, but no, they did not. They came out like little half-moons. No amount of canned icing made them look round. But they were damn tasty, those little mezzaluna cookies!!
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