Friday, September 23, 2005

The kitchen sink has changed

The year I finished high school, I spent part of the summer working at a camp, and my mother sent me a boxful of Kitchen Sink Cookies from the Recipes for a Small Planet cookbook. They helped fight off both hunger and homesickness, and I've thought of them fondly many times since then. But I hardly ever made them; I no longer had the cookbook though I knew there was a similar recipe in More Food that Really Schmecks.

Anyway, we suddenly had all the right things around (including soy flour) to make a batch of them, but I thought I'd do a Google search first to see if I could find the Small Planet recipe anywhere online and see if it was the same as the Schmecks recipe. A search for "Kitchen Sink Cookies" turned up cookie recipes containing--marshmallows? chopped candy canes? "candy coated pieces" (whatever those are, I assume M&M's)? And not a bit of soy flour in sight (even in Martha Stewart's recipe). The kitchen sink has changed a lot in twenty years.

So we (Ponytails, Crayons and I) made the Schmecks recipe, which is pretty close to the way I remember Kitchen Sink Cookies: a barely-sweet, slightly spicy granola-type cookie with chocolate chips as an indulgence that even the bean-sprout cooks couldn't leave out. Notice there's no baking powder or baking soda in them; they're dense, kind of like cookie-size granola bars.

Here's the recipe, which author Edna Staebler credits to her niece Nancy.

Kitchen Sink Cookies

1 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup soy flour
1 1/3 cups rolled oats
1/4 cup milk powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. each ground nutmeg and cloves (we go a little easier on the cloves)
2/3 cup raisins, or to taste
2/3 cup chocolate chips
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup oil or melted butter
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup molasses (I suddenly realized we were out, and substituted corn syrup)

Options to be added: (just about anything): 1/4 cup sesame seeds, or 3/4 cup coconut, or 1/3 cup sunflower seeds, or 1/4 cup peanuts, etc.

Mix all the dry ingredients, including the options. Beat the eggs, add oil, honey and molasses, and beat together. Pour liquid into dry ingredients and stir till moistened. If mixture is too dry (ours was), add milk or water. Drop by spoonfuls onto unoiled cookie sheet (we made ours teaspoonful-size). Bake 10 to 12 minutes, but watch them--especially if they're small, they can get done quite fast. They don't spread.

4 comments:

Leslie Noelani Laurio said...

It does look very close to the recipe in the Recipes for a Small Planet Book:

Kitchen Sink Cookies

1 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup soy flour
1 1/3 cup rolled oats
3/4 cup unsweet flaked coconut
1/4 cup milk powder (1/3 cup instant)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon connamon
1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger
2/3 cup raisins
2/3 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup peanuts, chopped
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup oil or melted butter
1/4 cup molasses
1/4 cup honey
2 eggs, beaten

Mix dry ingredients.
Mix liquid ingredients, then mix with flour mixture.
Add milk if it's too thick.
Drop onto unoiled cookie sheet.
Bake at 350 degrees 10-12 minutes

Mama Squirrel said...

Thanks, Tim's Mom! Looks like the coconut is the main thing (I didn't have any anyway), and the spices are a little different. But pretty close.

coffeemamma said...

These sound delicious! Any luck finding coconut without sulphites? I went everywhere in town today (including the health food store) and couldn't find any. Wah! I want some cookies!

Mama Squirrel said...

Try them without the coconut, Coffeemamma--we left it out and they're still good (we put in raisins, a few Craisins that were left over, sesame seeds, and sunflower seeds. And chocolate chips of course). That's why they're kitchen sink cookies: you can add everything but the kitchen sink.