First of all, I grew up in a farmhouse, complete with a large covered front porch, side porch and backporch. The side porch was covered with grapevines and made of stone. ( This is the porch show in the old photo from 1963 of my Mom and 6 kids. The youngest to be born in about 6 weeks from when the picture was taken. ) We picked the grapes to eat, large purple sweet and juicy grapes and also I remember making grape jam with my parents. I'm the oldest of the family, shown in the photo to the far right with my hand in front of my face, probably hiding a cookie. I grew up loving to bake, we baked from scratch cookies, pies, bread and rolls. Christmas was a bake-a-thon, every year my sister, mom and I would try to see how many flavors we could bake before the males in our family ate them right out of the freezer.
But back to the farmhouse. I loved that house with it's huge attic, 2 kitchens ( one we called a summer kitchen, I'm not sure why) and huge yard filled with fruit trees, pine trees, and peony bushes. I'm still looking for one to replace it, living in western Pennsylvania, the old farmhouses have given way to new construction and the suburbs. The house has been torn down to make way for a new house, the barn and yard are still there. Horses for riding replace the cows and chickens, my parents live in the house built in the late 60's where the corn used to grow. I've moved on to owning a cookie business with my husband in western PA in the suburbs of Pittsburgh and baking farmhouse cookies from recipes I've tweaked over the years! But more about that later.
Tomorrow is Sunday and I plan on making lasagna and working on our new photo and logo cookies coming soon at the cookie shop, but my husband and I will take the afternoon off to watch the Pittsburgh Penquins play game 5 in the semi-finals with the Philadelphia Flyers! They are home again for this game and we're hoping for a win to move on to the Stanley cup finals! Somehow, we managed to get tickets online for one of the home playoff games with the New York Rangers and well, there is nothing like playoff hockey. I would give up 10 regular season games for one playoff game. GO PENS!!!
and I decided to try some new ideas we have for the summer...cookie sandwiches! This one was by far the best, homemade peanut butter cookies, some with chocolate chips and some just rolled in sugar, filled with creamy peanut butter frosting. If you like peanut butter, these are worth trying. To make the frosting, just mix confectioner's sugar with cream cheese and peanut butter, mix in a teaspoon of pure vanilla and beat, adding a few tablespoons of water if too thick.
