Make Craig Allen’s ‘Aunt Emma’s Brown Cookies’

Right before Christmas, Bob Williams (New Jersey Traffic North) and I got to talking about making Christmas cookies.

At that point it was just that. Just talk.

Between it being almost Christmas, and the fact that I'm a busy guy...I do a lot around New Jersey 101.5, and for our our parent company Townsquare Media that's not in the spotlight in New Jersey...so, I didn't have time, at the time.

Follow me?

Anyhow, no time like the present. For some cookies.

Who is "Aunt Emma?"  She is an aunt of mine, many generations back, on my mom's side.  Like the recipe says: "very old." And, I wrote that a few (OK...many) years back.

In chatting with my mom, she says the recipe goes back to at least the 1880's.

Although they are "Christmas Cookies," these "brown cookies" are a family favorite all year round.

And, they're easy...but one step is time consuming, as you will see.

Let's get started:

Cream sugars, eggs, butter (I used 1&1/2 C melted butter, versus butter and spry, as I haven't used spry in years), baking soda, and cinnamon.

I added 2 C flour...

Rather that buying pre-sliced almonds...

...I put 1/4 C whole almonds in my chopper, and semi-coarsely chopped them.

I added the almonds...then the other 2&1/2 C flour.

The batter is thick.

I divided the batter in half.

Line a bread pan with plastic wrap, or wax paper.

Press the batter in the bottom of the lined bread pan.

Remove from the bread pan, and completely wrap the dough.

Here's the time consuming part:

The wrapped cookie dough goes into the freezer for one day (overnight).

Tomorrow (or a day or two later, if you're super busy, like me):

Unwrap, and slice into "cookies."

Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet, at 375, for 8-10 minutes.

Once you take the tray from the oven, let the cookies sit a minute or two before removing them from the tray.

When warm, these cookies are very fragile...so wait, before removing them to a wire rack to let them cool completely.

If you let them cool completely on the cookie tray, they'll stick to the tray, and be harder to remove without breaking.

How many cookies do you get? Anywhere from 45-50...depending on how thick you slice them.

Aunt Emma's (WONDERFUL) Brown Cookies are not only a favorite, but one of the first recipes I copied (above), as a kid, from my mother's recipe book...at Christmas.

When mom decided that I was old enough to start learning to cook (and bake), she gave me a loose leaf binder (wrapped and under the tree), with these words:

Thanks, mom, for my love of cooking.

Thanks Aunt Emma for the cookies...which now go...viral.