Thanks for sharing, Peggy! You'll have to let us know if you try and love any of the recipes. I want to make those big fat sugar cookies, Susan 
-Cassandra
WOW...these are wonderful Peggy. What treasures from your Grandma....spatters and all.
Yes, I bet that was the recipe for BIG FAT sugar cookies that I liked to make back when we were still living in Moorhead. I remember that Grandma remarked that she liked them. I still like them today, but since the recipe calls for a lot of Crisco AND butter, I think, I haven't made them in years. Thanks for the memory!
boy...these make me homesick. there are two cookbooks from Lutheran churches in Fargo: First Lutheran, which still has its cover, and Grace Lutheran, which is well-stained and missing its cover. The smaller skinnier one with the red spiral binding, is from either an Episcopal or Congregational church, i forget. look through it, and maybe you'll find a clue or two. it was from the church where our neighbors, Dotty and Mayo Carl, went.
The grasshopper pie was a specialty of Aunt Mary Barnes, my mom's favorite of my dad's sisters. She was very even-tempered (a rarity in the Dwyer family) and very sweet. When my mom visited Ann Arbor, there were two Marys in the house, so they called my mother "Mary Jane." That's what Aunt Mary called her ever after.
Mom wrote down the recipe after mom and dad made a trip to AA during which Aunt Mary served her famous grasshopper pie. The Grace Lutheran one has the recipe for "filled date cookies," which are my favorite date bars. It also has the recipe for the molasses crinkles. but that was my mom's name for them. they're just molasses cookies. The tip to which one is that you need to make little balls of the dough, dip them in sugar, place them on the cooking sheet, and give them a small indent with two fingers dipped in water.
tarnation! i had a nice comment all typed about these cookbooks and Aunt Mary Barnes and her grasshopper pie recipe, which my mother loved but never made herself except for bridge club after we were all gone from home.
perhaps because it had alcohol.
molasses crinkles was HER name for the cookies, not the name in the cookbook. look for the recipe that tells you to make balls of the dough, roll them in sugar, place them on the baking sheet, and then dip two fingers in water and tap the top of each cookie. that's the one.
the skinniest cookbook with the red spiral binding is from the episcopal or presbyterian church in fargo. our neighbors dotty and mayo carl went there. the third cookbook is from Grace Lutheran, where Mrs. Myhra (mother of my childhood pal Kay) went to church.
the grace lutheran one has the molasses cookie recipe and also my personal favorite, "date filled cookies" or date bars, as we called them. look for "surprise" cookies, too. they had a chocolate wafer tucked in each one so it didn't show. you didn't know it was there until you bit into it.
these pictures are making me feel very far from home indeed.
We get a Christmas card from an older friend address as "Mr and Mrs R....". Gee, does that get MP's blood boiling!
You must be so happy to have these recipe books - I love looking through recipe books and even plan to make good use of them once I am retired - you could even be treated to home made cake when you call in for a coffee!
Commenting by HaloScan
