Laura Bush's Texas Governor's Mansion Cowboy Cookies

These are Preston's favorite cookie, so in honor of his birthday, I am posting them today. The recipe makes a ton, and I get tired of scooping cookie dough and rotating sheets fairly quickly, so I usually freeze part of the dough in a log. Beware, though - the frozen cookie dough is really good. I've frozen it before and we haven't gotten around to ever baking the cookies because we ate all the dough frozen. Don't be like me. You shouldn't let your kids eat raw cookie dough and you shouldn't either. But you should make these cookies. They are crisp on the edges and chewy inside.

Laura Bush's Texas Governor's Mansion Cowboy Cookies

Recipe from Parent's Magazine

3 cups all-purpose flour
1 T baking powder
1T baking soda
1T cinnamon
1 t salt
1.5 cups (3 sticks) butter, softened
1.5 cups granualated sugar
1.5 cups brown sugar
3 eggs
1 T vanilla
2-3 cups chocolate chips
3 cups rolled oats
2 cups sweetened flaked coconut
2 cups chopped pecans, optional (I always opt out)


Mix dry ingredients in a bowl.

In a very large bowl, beat butter until smooth and creamy. Add in sugars and cream. Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each. Add vanilla.

Stir in flour mixture until just combined. Add chocolate chips, oats, and coconut and stir until combined.

Drop by 2 tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets, leaving plenty of room around each one.I usually do eight per sheet. They spread a lot, so you may want to mound the dough up higher. Bake at 350 for 11-13 minutes. Let cool a few minutes before removing to a rack to cool completely. Package some up and send them to Preston because I don't make them very often since they use 3 sticks of butter and 3 cups of sugar.

Coconut Lime Sugar Cookies

Sorry Mom. But I think these cookies are my current favorite. I've always liked sugar cookies better than chocolate chip. And these - oh, these are good. Preston made them last week and took them into work, then reported that they disappeared rather quickly. I just wish I could get some unsweetened coconut from the Cloverdale Country Store. I've only found it one place here and it's in the natural/organic section, so of course it's way overpriced. So sad.


Coconut Lime Sugar Cookies

from The Girl Who Ate Everything

2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup butter, softened

1 ½ cups white sugar

1 egg

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

zest of one large lime, finely minced

3 tablespoons lime juice

½ cup unsweetened toasted coconut*

½ cup sugar for rolling cookies

Combine flour, soda, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. In a separate bowl, beat butter and sugar until nice and fluffy. Add egg, vanilla, lime zest and juice and beat again. Add in dry ingredients and toasted coconut and blend gradually. Roll rounded teaspoonfuls in sugar and place on baking sheet. Bake 8-10 minutes until barely golden on the edges. Let sit two minutes on cookie sheets, then cool on wire racks.

*To toast coconut, simply spread on a baking sheet and place in the 350 oven for 5-7 minutes, checking carefully and shaking every couple of minutes. It browns quick, so watch carefully.

"Homemade" Brown Sugar

I was embarking on a baking project a couple weeks ago when I realized I was out of brown sugar, which happened to be an essential part of the recipe. I had plenty of white sugar, I always have molasses on hand for Dad's chewy ginger cookies, and somewhere in  my mind I knew that I could make my own brown sugar, so I looked it up and did it.  And guess what?  I haven't bought brown sugar since. This was too easy.

I followed these instructions from Noble Pig and it turned out wonderfully. 

For each cup of white sugar, add one tablespoon of molasses for light brown sugar and two tablespoons for darker brown sugar. I think I did four cups of sugar and added five or six Tb of molasses. Use the wire whip on your stand mixer or plan on standing for a long time with the hand mixer, start out on slow and then gradually increase the speed until all the little molasses balls are incorporated (5-8 minutes). Pat yourself on the back for saving yourself a trip to the grocery store and possibly, a few dollars.

My Favorite Chocolate Chip Cookies

I know how I like my chocolate chip cookies - like Grandma's. Soft and chewy and chippity and perfect. But my chocolate chip cookies don't taste like Grandmas. I usually get one of two results: 1 - Doughy, cakey blobs, or 2 - completely flat crunchy cookies that I have to cut apart before removing from the sheet. Grandma must have a secret ingredient (love?).

Anyway, when I feel like making cookies I don't make chocolate chip. Until today. These cookies from Joan at Allrecipes are just the way I like them. They are not traditional chocolate chip cookies, but they are delicious and chocolatey and peanut buttery. And isn't that what everyone really wants?

Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Oat Cookies (or in Joan's words, Outrageous CC Cookies)

1 stick butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter (use natural!)
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 egg
1 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup oats
1 cup semisweets

Cream butter and sugars, add peanut butter, vanilla, and egg and mix well. Mix flour, baking soda and salt separately, then add to wet ingredients. Stir in oats and chocolate chips. Roll into 1 inch balls and place on cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 10 minutes. A plus with these cookies is that they are quite filling due to the peanut butter and the oats. Two or three and I don't want any more (that's rare!), at least not for an hour or so.... Happy eating!

Helpful Hint: If you want cookies, but don't want to spend hours in a hot kitchen rolling cookies, you can mix up the dough, make just one sheet (or however many) and freeze the rest of the dough. Just double wrap it in Saran Wrap and it will keep for quite a while (not that it ever lasts very long in our house...). To use later, defrost in the refrigerator, or slice while frozen and cook a minute or so longer (but watch it carefully). I like doing this because I can control how many cookies are available to us at one time. And, of course, the next time I want cookies, I don't have to dirty any bowls or do any mixing!