Why Snickerdoodles Make me Smile

Do you ever think about how something acquired its name? I constantly try and figure out the origins of names. Maybe it's the linguist in me, maybe I am just curious, or maybe I watched The Little Mermaid with my daughter too many times (a thingamajigger anyone?).

Back to Snickerdoodles. It makes me smile every time I say it... when I looked up an origin story, I found that they are likely German or Dutch and from the late 1800's. Makes sense with the large number of German immigrants in our history. And either someone made up the word Snickerdoodle (A mom told her sweet little Doodlebug they could have a cookie and they snickered and it stuck??) or possibly it derived from the word schneckennudel (which is also fun to stay --go ahead, I will wait...see! It's fun!) Schnecken means snails. Yeah that was the face I made too. Nudel --guess what that means-yes! noodle. Now I don't know about you, but my Snickerdoodles neither look, nor taste, like snails.

Allrecipes has a small post about the origins, as does the Joy of Cooking. I personally would like to think that the early Amish and Mennonite bakers said "hey, let's see if we can make people call these cookies a fun name that they don't even know the meaning of" and it stuck. That makes me laugh.

The history lesson is almost over. For today. I think it is interesting that Snickerdoodles have been around for almost 150 years and there are still large numbers of people that have never heard of them, let alone eaten one. I never had them growing up, but that isn't too surprising since we had mostly the basics. They are favorites in our household now. They are a quick, easy, few ingredient treat that would be great for kids just learning how to bake. They are cinnamony (I can make up words too) and adaptable. I have made apple butter snickerdoodles, pumpkin snickerdoodles, gluten free snickerdoodles, caramel filled snickerdoodles, spiced snickerdoodles (feeling a little like Bubba in Forest Gump right about now)

Have fun and be creative with the recipe! This is the one I have been using since the beginning. I will not say it is fool proof, as I have messed it plenty of times and started over, throwing bad cookies away. That is how you learn to make good cookies! If everything was perfect the first time, we would all have a false sense of reality and we would never have new morphs of recipes!

Snickerdoodles

Oven at 375

In a mixing bowl combine

1/2 c butter

1/2c flour

Mix for a minute, making sure it is well combined

Add and mix well:

1c sugar

Add and mix well:

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

Add and mix well:

1 c flour

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4tsp cream of tartar

Scoop out dough (I use a scoop, but if you don't then roll dough into balls) and roll in cinnamon sugar

Place the dough balls on parchment lined cookie sheet and bake ~11 minutes, until the bottoms are just turning brown.

Let cool on cookie sheet, they will crisp up as they cool which is why you don't want to overbake

The second batch i made caramel filled. they were nummy....

**A few notes on this recipe.

• I have made them before without dividing the flour into two parts (I forgot) and just dumping it all in at once. It made really flat, gross cookies that promptly went into the garbage. It just didn't work. Other recipes may work like that but this one does not.

• I scoop and freeze the dough balls. I do not roll them in the cinnamon sugar when I do this until I bake them. I always have some sort of cookie dough ready to go in the freezer.

• I do make these gluten free and even gluten free and low sugar and they turn out almost exactly the same. Low sugar I use stevia instead of sugar in the dough and then use regular sugar for the cinnamon sugar part. I have even made them vegan using margarine or vegan butter.

• If I fill them, like with caramels, I cut a caramel in half and press it inside the scoop of dough and ball it in. Then I put the dough in the fridge to firm up before baking to reduce leakage. They still taste good even if they leak! To avoid leaky cookies, make sure the caramels are completely covered in dough, no cracks etc

Even if they turn out ugly, they are still good! Perfection is not necessarily the goal-- Trying is!!