My parents are downsizing.  Years ago I scored a vintage chair and ottoman from my grandparents’ family room, and later, my grandmother’s cedar chest.  And my Grandma O’Brien put masking tape on the back of everything anyone gave her, and when she passed away the 20 years worth of Christmas tree ornaments I gave her over the years came back to me.

But I didn’t think I’d see the day when my mom streamlined the cookie cutter collection.  She starts planning for Christmas in July, and decorations are sacred. Baking is another tradition, and every year we still enjoy tins and tins of toffee bars, fudge and peanut clusters.

During marathon decorating sessions mom was chief froster while the four kids manned stations at the dining room table with wax paper “placemats” and an arsenal of colored sugars, along with red hots — those powerful bursts of cinnamon.  We’d use them to punctuate the reindeer’s nose or the ringer of the bell.  And since Dad loved them, we’d make a few cookies entirely covered with them.  Mom did keep a few cutters that she uses most - a tree, a snowman, a boot.

I’m not sure which recipe I’ll use to inaugurate my new/old cookie cutter collection, but these are a few from my favorite blogs:

• Dorie Greenspan’s roll-out cookies: She posts a trio of links to Epicurious.
• Chez Panisse ginger snaps via David Lebovitz:  here they’re rolled and sliced, but they’d also be great cut-out cookies.
• Smitten Kitchen’s brownie roll-out cookies.

Tags: cookies

This entry was posted on Monday, December 8th, 2008 at 9:31 pm and is filed under In the kitchen. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.