Uncle Harold's Delicious Cookie Recipe
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I met up with my cousin David at a family birthday party for my Aunt M who turned 90. He is the son of my Great Uncle Harold. The story goes that when he was young, he drank a lot and met my Aunt Pauline who turned him onto Church and he never drank again. He credited her for saving his life, (which she undoubtedly did). They had two or three kids and when they left home, she fell apart, didn't know what to do with herself. So my Uncle Harold started doing all the housework, laundry and cooking. On top of working. Aunt P wore these tinted glasses all the time, even in the house and nagged my Uncle endlessly. "Harold, put your hat on, so you don't burn your bald head." "Harold, come and help me boil water." (seriously, she asked him to come to the kitchen for THAT)*** How I don't know, but he was without a doubt one of the most cheerful, happy people I have ever met. My brother and I loved to go to his house with my Grandpa for a visit, because we got to be grown ups and have tea and some of his fabulous cookies. They are pretty brown, so I always thought they had a hint of molasses, but SURPRISE they don't.
***to say one kind word about Aunt P - if you could get her off of nagging Uncle Harold and actually talking, she was pretty interesting, but it took some effort to do that! They stayed married for 60 years till death so the marriage must have had some positives!
ONE final word before the recipe - even if you don't like raisins, you won't taste them in this recipe. Not very distinctly anyway, so give it a try, maybe half a recipe?
Uncle Harold's Soft Raisin Cookies
1 cup (each) ground raisins and walnuts
2 sticks margarine
4 cups flour
1 tsp. soda in 1 cup buttermilk
½ tsp nutmeg
2 eggs
1 tsp salt
1-1/2 cups sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp lemon flavoringMix together and bake till done. Put one whole raisin on top of each cookie before baking.
Oven temperature - 350
The recipe above is all I got. So I would cream the softened margarine (or butter), sugar and eggs, spices and flavorings with a mixer. Fold in with a wooden spoon, alternately the flour and buttermilk, then the raisins & walnuts.
Now the recipe doesn't say how long to bake them, but I would imagine 8-10 minutes for 3 or 4" cookies. Uncle Harold always made them as big as a DVD, so I don't know how long those would bake. Keep in mind the end product is a soft cookie when deciding if they're done or not.
Suggestion - I would probably experiment with a bit of cinnamon in addition to the nutmeg. Also, today's homes don't usually have old fashioned metal meat grinders. I have done this for other recipes. Chop walnuts in a nut chopper or blender to measure one cup and then add the raisins and chop in a blender or food processor. The raisins will blend with the walnuts and not make a sticky mess.
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MMmmm Cookies :cheers:
