Over Thanksgiving, I “helped” my mother-in-law bake cranberry pistachio biscotti and create a very yummy rice pudding. She, too, is a math person. I watched her carefully measure ingredients and presliced-dough thickness, length, and width. She even measured the temperature of the water she brewed tea. With a significant amount of excess energy now that my fibromyalgia was pretty much under control and a limited amount of time spent tutoring, I realized that this could be the perfect new mathematically-artistic hobby that could also double as a husband-coddler and social outlet (hostess gifts at parties, thank yous to students, etc.).

After discovering allrecipes.com, I began to bake a new batch of cookies nearly every day for three weeks, sending the cookies to my husband’s office. It was interesting, fun, and soothing. It also was great to hear feedback and yummy noises. The first cookie was extremely successful, but the second and third were only acceptable. So I decided to be more picky with recipes and scoured allrecipes.com to compare similar recipes. I also read all the comments for technique advice and to learn ways to doctor the recipes for best results, then I began to “Frankenstein” recipes and create my own.

Here are my first cookies. My very first attempts to bake from scratch. Later on, I’ll post recipes for the most successful ones.

The most successful cookies were the Pumpkin Chocolate Chip with Walnuts (I later baked them for my town’s cookie swap), Red Velvet (which were like little cakes), anything with peanut butter, and the Chocolate Cranberry Macadamia Dreams (which I don’t understand – but, then again, I passionately dislike white “chocolate”).

The gluten-free cookies were a hit, despite the oily-gooey look of a dough made almost entirely of peanut butter and egg. I baked them for my husband’s maternal step-grandfather, Grandpa Bernie, and mailed them to him in L.A. along with Pumpkin Walnut Chocolate Chip cookies for Grandma Susie (who adopted me when Peter and I adopted kittens together, a week before graduating college and moved in together), and some peanut-butter bones for Aunt Patsy, their sheltie. Actually, I just baked another batch last night to mail to Grandpa Bernie.

The dog cookies were for pets of family members and students’ pets. It was difficult to find a good recipe – so many include pureed liver or beef boullion or other icky meat ingredients (I refuse to bake with meat).  These had peanut butter and flour. The next hurdle had been the lack of a rolling pin in my arsenal, so I used the dowel for the paper towel roll. My cats were steadfastly against the idea of eating anything baked – I put a crumb the same size as one of their dry food in their bowl, and it was removed. Every time I was in the kitchen, at least one of the cats would walk by, sniff the crumb, give me a dirty look, and send a Siamese-style me-yowl in my general direction. I think I’ll stick to fresh tuna as their rare treat. However, my students’ dogs are now all in love with me and my parents Poodle, Spike, refused his milkbone and nosed the dog-food cabinet door until my dad gave them a broken-up half of my cookie.

The only negative response was the crescents. My maternal grandmother used to make these every Christmas. I didn’t remember anyone liking them, but my Babi passed away the previous Christmas and I figured making these would be a nice gesture for my mom. It was, but we only liked the sugar and chocolate-dipped end. However, the look on my mother’s face as she had a mouthful of a chocolate-dipped end, trying to smile and make yummy noises, was absolutely priceless… I let her off the hook after the first bite and admitted I didn’t think they were very good and she didn’t have to finish it.  Interesting to note: it turns out that nut-based dough is a staple of Czech baking. Since neither Peter nor anybody on my side of the family likes almond-sweet delicacies, I’ll be avoiding most Czech cookies from this point on. However, there is a walnut cake (nusstorte) that was an absolute childhood favorite that I’ll definitely be trying once I get a springform pan.

The first cut-outs were for my nephews and niece, who don’t like chunks of things in their cookies. Then I made slightly spicier gingerbread cookies for some friends’ parties. My target audiences certainly enjoyed them, but I had some issues with decorating. First, the icing wasn’t thick enough, and then the plastic icing tubes for decorating did not exactly have even distribution of piping. But I did my best with it until I ran out after making the 10-sided die for my friend’s game party.

I now have a Wilton Beginner’s Decorating Kit and the lesson plan book (ordered separately through Amazon). I’ll be learning how to pipe over the next month. So I’ll also be trying to bake some cupcakes and cakes. Not to worry, I’ll take you on that bumpy journey with me…