Your patronage of our
affiliate
partners supports this web site. We thank you!
Schrafft’s Butterscotch Cookies
Lost Recipes: Meals to Share with Friends and Family
© 2003 by Marion Cunningham (A Borzoi Book, Alfred A. Knopf)
Makes about 30
large cookies
“This is a cookie with a past. My editor, Judith Jones, remembers fondly these
big, rich, crisp cookies that she used to get as a child from the nearly
Schrafft’s. Schrafft’s was originally a Boston company, but it had thriving
bakeries and restaurants all over New York that have since disappeared. So we
asked James Beard where we could get the original recipe. Judith wanted to
include it in the book about New England she was writing with her husband, and I
wanted it for
Fannie Farmer Baking Book
James, as always, responded in a flash and
procured the recipe from the retired
head of the company. The formula was for
about 20 pounds of cookies and called
for hydrogenated industrial products we’d
never heard of. “Just use Crisco and a little butter,” James advised, and so we
did, reducing the amounts to workable numbers. The cookies are always a great
hit
with anyone tasting them for the
first time, and will bring back memories for
those who grew up on Schrafft’s.”
2
tablespoons butter, room temperature
3/4 cup vegetable shortening, at room temperature
(James Beard always preferred Crisco)
1 1/4 cups packed dark brown sugar
1 egg
2 tablespoons nonfat dry milk
1 tablespoon vanilla
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup finely chopped pecans
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees [F]. Grease cookie sheets.
Combine the butter and shortening in a large mixing bowl and beat for a
few
seconds. Add the sugar and beat until creamy. Add the egg, dry milk,
and vanilla
and beat until light. Stir the flour, baking soda, and salt with a
fork to mix
and lighten. Add to the sugar-butter mixture and blend. Stir in
the pecans and
mix well.
Drop heaping tablespoons of dough 2 inches apart onto the cookie sheets.
Dip the bottom of a glass 3 inches in diameter into flour and use it to press
the dough down in a circle of the same dimension. If the dough sticks a little
as you lift the glass, scrape it from the glass and just pat any bits back into
the circle of dough to make it even and neatly round. Dip the glass into the
flour again after each pressing.
Bake the cookies for 7 to 10 minutes, until golden brown. Remove from
the oven and gently loft the cookies onto a rack. Let cool and store in an
airtight container.
Featured
Archive Recipes:
Brown Sugar
Cookies, Paul Prudhomme's
Brown Sugar Ginger
Crisps
Butterscotch
Chip Oatmeal Cookies
Butterscotch-Pecan Bars with Caramel Drizzle
Butterscotch Pecan Cookies (Lee Bailey)
Caramel
Crunch Cookies
Pecan Dreams, Gigi's
Pecan Pie Squares,
Gigi's
Pecan
Tassies
Schrafft's Hot Fudge Sauce
Index - Cookie Recipe Archives
Recipe Archives Index
|