Secret Sugar Cookies

Let me pick up where I left off.  Or rather where I began.  This recipe for soft sugar cookies is still a favorite.  My Gram made these soft sugar cookies she sometimes called "cake cookies."  Her cookies were lightly scented with nutmeg and vanilla.  They tasted a bit like a shortcake.  Just barely sweet.

The sugar cookie recipe was a closely guarded secret when I was a child.  Gram wouldn't share it because she wanted to be the one who made the cookies.  My father loved to eat these cookies when we visited Iowa, and when she visited Oregon, Gram would bring a tin of her cookies.  Surprising us all, when my brother got married, my grandma bypassed her own children and grandchildren and gave the recipe to my sister-in-law, who did not bake.  My sisters and I were jealous.

At the time, I worked at a school, so I researched soft sugar cookie recipes and once a week, my class made sugar cookies to share with the school.  After a few weeks, I found the recipe that best matched my Gram's.  Fast forward to a night I stayed at my brother's.  Early the next morning, I snuck into the kitchen and found the recipe box.  I read over the sugar cookie recipe and discovered it exactly matched the "southern sugar cookie" recipe I found online.  Turns out my Gram's recipe was not much of a secret after all.

This cookie recipe was my first blog post here.  Since I last wrote, I had to give up gluten.  I subbed the all-purpose flour with Bob's Red Mill gluten free 1-to-1 flour.  I also subbed cardamom for the nutmeg.  I made them with my daughter and they turned out great.  They brought back memories.  We created new memories.  And as we enter the colder months and reflect on a stressful year of battling a pandemic and fighting for civil rights, perhaps we could use the comfort of Gram's sugar cookies.