Old-Fashioned "Good Cookies" and frosting

As some of you already know, I live in a really small town (under 200 people). We do have a post office and little store selling gas and items such as bread, milk, candy and soda, but we don't have any restaurants and can't get delivery. Once a month we have a visit from the bookmobile. It's just as it sounds... a bread truck looking vehicle filled with books you can check out from a public library that's located about 20 miles away. This month I checked out a really interesting cookbook called The Farmer's Wife Baking Cookbook. I've had a great time looking through the recipes which were published in a monthly magazine called The Farmer's Wife from 1893-1939. I found this recipe simply called Good Cookies, which was published in the October 1913 issue. I'll give you the recipe as it was published in the magazine and then I will give you the recipe as I made it.

GOOD COOKIES
2 cups sugar
1 cup butter
1 cup sour cream or buttermilk
3 eggs
1 tsp. baking soda

Mix soft, roll thin, cut into shapes, sift granulated sugar over them and gently roll it in. Bake on buttered baking sheet in a hot oven.

You probably notice this recipe doesn't give an amount for flour and the directions are lacking to say the least. These were amazing cooks to bake successfully with such vague directions! Good Cookies are basically a sugar cookie. I didn't know what to expect and only made 1/2 a batch. I had a very hard time rolling these out and cutting them into shapes because the dough is so soft, so I rolled them into meatball sized balls, rolled them into sugar and then flattened them slightly with the bottom of a cup before baking them. I pressed sprinkles into some of them before baking and the others I iced with an easy butter, milk, powdered sugar and vanilla frosting.


GOOD COOKIES (as I made them)
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup sour cream
1 large egg
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 3/4 cups flour

Cream butter and sugar. Mix in sour cream and egg. Combine flour and baking soda and stir into wet mixture. Roll into meatball sized balls and roll into sugar. Place onto greased cookie sheet and flatten slightly with the bottom of a cup. Bake at 400 for 6-8 minutes.

FROSTING
1 stick butter, room temperature
4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla

Cream softened butter and add 2 cups sugar, milk and vanilla. Beat until smooth. Gradually add the reast of the sugar until it reaches spreadable consistency.

Comments

Donna-FFW said…
How cool is that to look through a cookbook that is almost 100 years old. Did you find you liked the taste of the cookie?
Tina Butler said…
I love the Farmers Wife Cookbooks they are awesome. I grew up Military in Hawaii and Nebraska we had a bookmobile that came every tuesday and returned the next tuesday. It was such fun to wait for the truck to arrive and check out books. I so miss those days, you are so lucky Heidi my kids would love that. The cookies look so good. the oldies are always the goodies.
justjoycee said…
I would love to get my hands on that book. I will check the library. Nice post, sounds like a good life where you live. I will try this recipe. Best wishes to you and your family.
justjoycee said…
OMG....I love your choice of songs...GREAT SONGS.
Sandy's Kitchen said…
I never heard of a book mobile. That sounds really interesting. I was actually thinking about purchasing that particular cook book since I have heard so many things about it. I didn't think to check it out in the library. I think I may just go do that.
Heidi said…
Donna- The cookies are very good. They're a moist, cake type sugar cookie. I rolled half the first batch and that completely changed the texture. It made them tough, so I didn't make anymore rolled ones (they were also VERY difficult to roll out because the dough is so soft... I even chilled the dough and they still were very hard to roll).

Mommy- I saw you had the farmers wife cookbooks as your favorites on your page. Do the other farmers wife cookbooks have good recipes? I would like to check them out. Our bookmobile only comes the 3rd Wednesday of the month. You would laugh at our huge sacks of books we get!

Justjoycee- I'm glad you like my songs. I didn't know if people enjoyed them or found them to be annoying! We do have a great life in our small town. I live on main street and the part I live on is gravel! I live next door to my grandma and my parents and in-laws live 2 blocks away. Our entire town is 2 blocks by 6 blocks. It's great, but everyone knows all your business!

Sandy- The library is a great place for cookbooks. I aways get the annual taste of home books and the gooseberry patch and food tv stars cookbooks too. I just copy the recipes I like and it saves a lot of money. You can preview the cookbooks before buying and take some you normally wouldn't purchase. Sometimes those end up being the best!
Coleens Recipes said…
It sounds like your book mobile brings quite an interesting assortment of books! The cookies look wonderfully old fashioned (thats a great thing).
teresa said…
How fun, these do look like good cookies! I love the idea of a bookmobile!
GypsyMommy said…
How wonderful. I'll have to look for that next time I'm at the library.

Those cookies look so good. With the kids on spring break, I may have to make these with them!