Our cookie making schedule was a little thrown off by my trip out of town, but we recovered, and last night was our third attempt. This week we made crackly cinnamon wafers (p. 71), and they were quite tasty.

My skill with the electric mixer is improving, although I must admit that I find myself oddly stressed while using it. I commented that I felt as if I were in a race, because the dough-making process goes so much more quickly and is not at all meditative (which I generally find baking to be). With this recipe, though, the dough also went quickly because there was so little to it — butter, sugar, an egg, flour, and cinnamon. The more elaborate and somewhat time-consuming part of the process was putting them on the sheets: it required making small uniform balls, squishing them flat with the floured bottom of a glass, brushing them with an egg white mixture, and then sprinkling sugar on top of them.

In general, they were very close to how we imagined they would be, and a very light, buttery, melt-in-your-mouth kind of cookie, perfect to accompany tea or coffee. They did not taste as strongly of cinnamon as we’d expected, especially with the strong cinnamon smell that filled the kitchen as they baked. We also didn’t put quite enough sugar on the tops of the first batch; we used granulated sugar, as we hadn’t been able to easily locate sparkling white sugar, which comes in larger crystals and likely would have increased the crackly nature of the cookies.

They disappeared, well, like cookies when we shared them with our friends this afternoon, though, so I think we can safely call them a success.

overall ratings:
ease of preparation: 3.5
match to expectations: 2.5
“the cookie itself”: 3.5