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Cook the Book: 'Baking, From My Home to Yours'

Some people think that dessert may only be eaten after finishing the main dishes devoid of refined sugar. These people may even call dessert the most dispensable part of a meal. [shudders] However, if you're anything like me you know that dessert is the most important part of a meal, if not nutritionally (okay, definitely not nutritionally) then psychologically. Anything that comes before dessert may be tasty, but by the nature of not being dessert is also a barrier to the ice cream sundae or chocolate layer cake that eagerly awaits prodding from your dessert spoon.

Dorie Greenspan might know what I'm talking about—otherwise I don't think she would've written Baking: From My Home to Yours, a bible of all things sweet and baked. While flipping through the book I was overcome by a blinding desire to preheat the oven and start whipping up something, anything, everything. And I rarely bake. Maybe this book and its full-page photos of desserts in their final moments of carefree existence before being devoured will also inspire you to spend an afternoon in your kitchen, sweating by the heat of your oven.

This week we are giving away ten (10) copies of the book. For a chance to win, let us know what your favorite type of cookie is in the comments section until 9 p.m. ET Friday. The usual Serious Eats contest rules apply.

Comments are closed: 211 Comments:

Chocolate chip with oatmeal is my favorite. I'll try any fresh cookie so long as there are no raisins. I can't believe how many decent bakeries and store bakery counters sell lousy, days-old cookies. I'm almost always skeptical, so it's caused me to do a lot of my own baking.

I must follow Kathy in Oakland's lead (she posted at 1:57pm on July 16) and agree that chocolate chip with oatmeal is my favorite cookie - esp. the version that is the called The Neiman Marcus cookie - see snopes for the story: http://www.snopes.com/business/consumer/cookie.asp

Either shortbread, or gingersnaps with as much ginger as possible. Fresh, crystalized, powdered... throw it all in.

snickerdoodle. they are buttery with cinnamon and sugar. just the best.

I've recently fallen in love with molasses cookies..

Peanut butter cookies!

Or, chocolate chip oatmeal with crystallized ginger, a great twist on the classic.

nice thin chewy chocolate chip cookies.... they're the best.

Ginger thins!

Only I ate so many this one time that I haven't been able to look at once since....

but in theory, I still like them!

I like chocolate chocolate chip cookies....yum. Big chunks o' chocolate!

Even though they're not baked, I'm still addicted to my mom's Chocolate-Oatmeal No-Bake Cookies. Beyond that, the baked ones are soft M&M or chocolate chip. Oh, and of course, Thin Mints and the related Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies!

chocolate chip with pecans and dried cherries!

Thin mints! Maybe because you can only get them part of the year.

oatmeal chocolate chip, for sure. but still chewy, not cooked to a crisp.

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Oatmeal a close second. Also I think this is the best baking book EVER! Great Give-a-way!

From the Once Upon a Tart cookbook-- chocolate chip oatmeal cookies with dried cranberries (wheat germ is added for an extra crunch-- incredible cookie!).

The Wild Oats near me has several good cookies. One has tahini, dates and carob. Tahini is great in cookies.

Palmiers are fantastic.

J Pistone, a great Cleveland area bakery/gourmet store, makes terrific pecan crescent cookies. Light, buttery and delicious.

Rosie's Bakery cappuccino shortbread sails are one of my favorite cookies to make at home.

OREO'S! sorry, i know these are super industrial processed poison, but they taste sooooo goooooooooooood

reverse chocolate chip-chocolate with white chocolate chips. soo good

i just love soft oatmeal/raisin cookies. my mother use to make them and so did my friends moms. once three of us drove cross country from NC to CA and to sustain ourselves we each had our mom bake five dozen cookies each. it was the best three weeks of our lives(up until that point!)

My favorite: ginger snaps, especially with a nice cup o'tea! I've never made my own but I want to try. Whole Foods used to make their own under the 365 brand that had big chunks of candied ginger, but I think they changed the recipe and the chunks are gone :(

Snickerdoodles. Or Cinnamon Snickers as my mom called them are still my fav!

Banana oatmeal walnut cookies. Chewy. Recipe is from St. Augustine, FL Junior League cookbook. Also love my Mother's molasses & walnuts cookies...again, chewy not crispy!

duplex sandwich cremes

gotta be chocolate chip!

Brown sugar cookies!

Only one favorite? Oatmeal with raisins or chocolate. Anything with peanut butter!

espresso chocolate chip cookies

Snickerdoodles of course! What could be better than a buttery sugar cookie with an added bonus of a cinnamon topping?

black and white cookies. but only to look at.

Crisp on the outside and chewy within, it's got to be double chocolate with dried cherries.

Molasses cookies. raisins optional

Honey pots from Rosie's Bakery. Or a nice chewy molasses cookie.

Honey pots from Rosie's bakery. Or a nice chewy molasses.

I love chocolate chip cookies. I've had particular success with Alton Brown's chewy recipe.

chocolate cookies with peanut butter chips. or the reverse, peanut butter cookies with chocolate chips.

Italian macaroons ("amaretto") NOT the coconut ones

Sherry Yard's gingersnaps. Tried them last week, and never before had I inhaled anything so quickly.

ben's cookies! they're based in London. dark chocolate chunk and their praline and chocolate chunk are by far some of the best cookies I've ever had. cake cookies.

ooh, chocolate chip oatmeal cookies with cranberries, natch

Lionel Poilâne's Punitions, of course.

Fudgy peanut-butter brownies

I've recently tried an apple-oatmeal-walnut cookie with icing that is very pleasing.

Black and whites! Full size, extra cakey.


Oh gosh...I love delicious, vaguely salty chocolate shortbread cookies, and hard, chewy, fiery gingersnaps, and fat chocolate chip cookies and my mother's rosewater and black pepper cookies.

White chocolate and macadamia nut - very soft, please!

my favorite cookie... too many! but classic crispy chocolate chip is so amazing.

Florentine Lace cookies are my FAVORITES! And have such a problem finding them sometimes.
I also love Oatmeal Chocolate Chip.

Mascarpone-filled chocolate sandwich cookies!

@tidmus: WORD! Punitions to the max.

My favorite is classic chocolate chip. I could make a "top 5" list, but chocolate chip...that's where it's at. And a handful of punitions on the side.

Snickerdooooodles!

My Mom hates peanut butter, so I looked forward to bake sales at school so I could purchase the sweet, sweet goodness of peanut butter cookies with hershey kisses plopped on top.

Oatmeal raisin barely beats out chocolate chip ... I love the classic cookies the best.

Do pecan tassies count? Otherwise, chewy chocolate chip and pecan cookies!

I hope meringue counts.. But if it doesnt (WHY???), I like cornflake cookies, which might be an indonesian thing. Just pour chocolate ganache over cornflakes, mix well, spoon them over cookie cases, cool and voila! Crunchy, easy, and chocolate-y. Doesn't get any better than that.

i love any cookie with oatmeal in it. and in terms of commercially processed cookies i can never eat less than five of those albertson's brand maple cookies in one sitting.

My Nana's whipped shortbread-I try to emulate it year after year, but never quite get it. Nonetheless, the attempts are enjoyable!

a big, fat slightly-crispy-on-the-outside-but-chewy-on-the-inside-chocolate chip cookie with walnuts...and any variation of it...

Shortbread, but the chocolate chip cookies from the Fannie Farmer Cookbook are a close second.

My girlfriend make the best chocolate chip cookies. Those are my favorite.

Fresh oatmeal raisin sandwich cookies with some kind of ridiculously sweet and rich filling that only slightly oozes out the sides when I bite into them.

Ginger Cookies.

Ginger-molasses cookies. Or, the cowboy cookie.

At the moment, Gille's double chocolate oatmeal crisps, which keep luring me back to Ikea, despite the fact that I have no need for more furniture. Le Petite Ecoliers with the slab o' chocolate on top come a close second.

Carole Walter's Great Cookies is an amazing cookbook -- she has a recipe for a shortbread cookie layered with melted chocolate and a nutty chocolate meringue top -- completely delicious. Otherwise, the chocolate chip cookies at Levain Bakery in NY are indecently good.

mom's oatmeal cranberry cookies

"Aunt Lucy's Pumpkin Cookies." And, no, she wasn't my Aunt Lucy. :)

My boyfriend makes a cookie that he calls "Sin."- It's a basic Toll-House chocolate chip recipe, but he adds cocoa powder, then chocolate, cinnamon, peanut butter, and white chocolate chips, and dried cherries. They're truly sinful. :-)

Ginger Bread Men...persons?

The best cookies for my money are raspberry Rugelach (singular, Rugel?) from Delancy Bros. bakery. Actually, any bakery that can pull off the ruglach with a soft swirl of dough and a nice flakey exterior does it for me. Runner up: white lace cookies. Mmmmmm.

City Bakery melted chocolate chip cookie

French macarons...especially Pierre Herme. I still dream (and weep) of that etheral, awesomely delicious, macaron that is impossible to find in NYC.

My wife's chocolate chip cookies

Macaroons from Bouchon Bakery

Oatmeal with chocolate chunks and coconut. To die for!

Chocolate espresso cookies

I love those rugelah cookies, the ones with jam and nut in the middle

I love lemon poppy seed cookies.

homemade oreos!

little debbie oatmeal creme pies

Chocolate chip with the Nestle's choc. chip bag recipe (which never fails for me!). I also love chocolate crinkle cookies, a family favorite at Christmas time.

I'm a sucker for those Pierre Herme Korova cookies (dark chocolate with fleur de sel.)

ANZAC biscuits. Like oatmeal cookies on steroids, and they keep forever.

m&m - my recipe calls for a package of vanilla pudding. mmmmmm

One? Just one? OK, by a slim margine, I'd have to go for any ginger snap, crisp, but once broken with your teeth and soften a bit.......zammo, hot and spicy. Golly, that leaves mom's peanut butter cookies and snickerdoodles and .... and..... and.

I've never met a cookie I didn't like, but my fave is...peanut butter :)

Chocolate with extra large choclate chunks

Peanut Butter Cookies are my favorite (Right Out The Oven)!!!

My faves have white chocolate and macadamia nuts.

peanut butter cookies with lots of chocolate chips

Mint cocolate chip meringe cookies

ginger snaps - Trader Joe's has a triple ginger version that I can eat WAY too many of.

ginger snaps - but they have to be really spicy.

Brownies Brownies Brownies. And Dorie Greenspan's recipe (New York Times) is the best. What a wonderful book this must be!

hazelnut biscotti made with aniseeds!

White chocolate chip/macadamia nut cookies are the bomb.

Oatmeal Heath Bar

chocolate chocolate chip

oatmeal raisain with nuts

Slightly warm Chocolate chips cookies!!!

I'm not sure this counts, because it's a bit of a variation:
My favorite summertime treat is an ice cream sandwich made with white chocolate gelato and cinnamon wafer cookies. Both elements are raised to the height of sublime by their pairing.

As someone who grew up with a Polish mother who baked all sorts of delicious cookies--and other traditional baked goods, I have a soft spot for baking cookbooks....just looking at the photos takes me back to my mom's kitchen. While not from the old country, the cookie my mom made that became my favorite is a perfectly baked macaroon cookie--pure and simple--not dipped in chocolate, no extra flavor added.

Snickerdoodles.The best cookie.ever.

Crispy Peanut Butter is my downfall !

Chocolate chip cookies from Nancy Baggett's "All-American Cookie Book". Chewy, buttery, and brown sugary. Mmmm.

White chocolate and Macadamia nut is one of my favorites with a brownie type cookie running a close second...oh, and Thin Mints...oh, and a chewy Oatmeal cookie...and the list could go on and on!

Gotta be a white chocolate macadamia nut cookie. I don't know what it is about that combo that gets me every time. Fortunately, one or two will satisfy the craving!

My favorite is a sugar cookie (homemade with sour cream in the dough) and iced--enough of a sugar blast to satisfy my super sweet tooth!!

ginger molasses cookie, closely followed by white chocolate macadamia or brown sugar w/ walnuts

The best cookies are fresh-baked and soft. My favorites include white chocolate and macadamia nut and my aunt's pizzelles (not a true cookie, maybe, but delish anyway).

sugar cookie dipped in chocolate

My mom makes what she calls "wafer cookies". Two flaky, buttery cookies with buttercream icing (traditionally colored pink or light green) between them. So good.

I am a sugar cookie fan and have been forever. Lemon or plain sugar. Sometimes wth icing or sprinkles. Plain and fancy. One can never go wrong with that one sugar cookie recipe and the 12 versions you can get from it.
But a pizelle is like potato chips you can never eat just one.

oatmeal chocolate chip!

shortbread cookies are my all time favorite. I just love the buttery yumminess that melts in your mouth. hmmm I think I need to go and make some right now.

any kind of shortbread with sea salt: chocolate, lemon, lavender...they're all lovely

definately gingersnaps- delicious year round, especially if they include chucks of crystallized ginger

chocolate chip cookies... though I sometimes like to mix it up and and put peanut butter or butterscotch chips in also.

Now, chocolate chip with walnuts or pecans. But in college I had a roomate that used to make the world's best cookies. They were called Yankee Quakers, but since I lost the recipe long ago I haven't had them in years.

Peanut butter cookies, made with chunky peanut butter, Joy of Cooking recipe.

Mexican Wedding Cookies, preferably made with the Alabama pecans I buy in the fall. However, if I'm in a hurry the ones from Whole Food are darn good.

Homemade peanut butter cookies with peanut butter chips

Chocolate chip; sometimes the simplest things are the best.

Fabulous toffee chip, chocolate chunk and dried cherry oatmeal cookies that I got from a Martha Stewart show!

PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES ARE THE BEST!

White chocolate macadamia nut cookies...yum!

Extra-soft molasses cookies are the best

My favourite by far are chocolate lava cookies - it's a new recipe that I developed from a lava cake recipe. They're to die for!

Either peanut butter, soft oatmeal raisin, or molasses...there are just so many good cookies out there (and so many horrible store bought ones as well!)
Basically, I'll eat anything without chocolate, though (I know, I'm a chocolate-hating freak, but believe me, I get enough grief about it from my chocoholic friends...)

Chocolate chip
Oatmeal Raisin
Oreos

Peanut Butter, with extra salted peanuts folded in....

Chocolate cracks, from a Maida Heatter's Book of Great Desserts

Definitely oatmeal-chocolate chip with loads of walnuts.....unless of course, homemade whoopie pies with peanut butter filling are considered a cookie!

dark chocolate with macadamia nuts

snickerdoodles are my favorite home made cookie. my grandmother spoilt me when i was little.

oatmeal raisin cookies are my favorite.

cornmeal cookies studded with candied pecans

I love really spicy ginger snaps, the thin, crispy ones that snap!

Mmmm, a soft warm chocolate chip cookie!

Oatmeal chocolate chip, still kinda warm, no nuts!

TKOs(oreos for grownups) and NutterButters from Bouchon Bakery

chocolate chip + milk

Definately New York Cheesecake!!!!!!!!!!!!! Mmmmmmmm!!!! Yummy!!!!!!!!!

super crunchy pistachio biscotti dipped in black coffee

I love honey cardamom cookies when my sister bakes them. When I bake them, they torn into sweet rocks. When she bakes them, they are chewy bites of heaven. :)

Pierre Hermé's passion fruit macarons. I wish he had a shop here in NYC.

Usually I lean towards cookies chock full of spice, or chocolate, or black sesame...mmm peanuty-esque goodness.

Yet, recently I found this chunky french cookie recipe in the one upon a tart book. It had cranberries in it, but I swapped out cherries, and really really good chocolate for crumby chips. They were so loaded with stuff in the way that a good chocolate chip cookie should always be loaded, but when I was baking them I was worried that they wouldn't cook right...that they would just be a giant melty gooey blob of chocolate nutty fruity goodness.

Now though I realize they just needed more chocolate...and I know this sounds blasphemous, but who is dory greenspan? ^^

oatmeal raisin. tasty!

I was going back and forth, mired in indecisiveness, until I remembered Oreos. Definitely Oreos.

Those crispy, spicy little Biscoff cookies that they give you on airplanes.

I like to bake chewy oatmeal cookies with different treats in them. Sometimes I'll use craisins, candied ginger and walnuts. Sometimes I'll add pumpkin and cinnamon. My husband likes them with almonds and semi-sweet and white chocloate chunks. No matter what I put in them though, they always make our house smell delish!

Oatmeal cookies with chocolate chips and walnuts! Yum!

Chocolate chip.

I'm all for chocolate chip, but coconut-chocolate meringues are what make me empty the cookie jar.

My favorite cookies contain more butter than any other ingredient. The dough is so good, you're tempted to eat an entire batch without turning on the oven.

There's a little salt, less sugar than many recipes require, and they're almost always under-baked by a minute or two. That way, they remain chewy and moist even when teeth first encounter the crunch of sugar, a hardened frosting, crusty glaze or crispness before piercing the crumb.

There are a few exceptions to this general rule, especially when ginger is stirred into the dough. However, the question asks about favorites and my favorite cookies are naked.

While I adored Toll House cookies as a child, rolling out, cutting and frosting cookies at Christmas was such an important family ritual that I have developed a thing for spicy dough and cookies that grow more tender and flavorful as they age in tins.

As an adult, I am grateful for ingredients that were not available when I was young and big blocks of dark chocolate have replaced bags of milk chocolate chips. Valrhona cocoa. Organic pistachio paste. Fresh rosemary and pine nuts. The pleasure of new, unexpected flavors is hard to compare with comforting nostalgia.

I'm torn between a love of grated gingerroot and crystallized ginger on the one hand and bittersweet chocolate on the other. Chocolate wins when it promotes what men and women in dark suits cannot hope to deliver as they stand before microphones and plead.

It is difficult for me to narrow my favorites down to just 1 cookie, but a few of my favorites are Gingersnaps, Peanut Butter Cookies, Biscotti, and Chocolate Chip.

Chocolate chip cookies made with lots of good butter. No crisco here. With icy cold milk. Mmmmmm :)

banana bread

grandma's frosted sugar cookies!

The oatmeal, cherry, coconut, walnut cookies that I make.

toffee sugar cookies

My favorite cookie is peanut butter with chocolate chips.

Soft chewy oatmeal raisin cookies right out of the oven

sigh, oh man, those city bakery chocolate chip cookies stole my heart :)

Mexican wedding cakes/russian tea cakes. I've heard them called both. Those dense, nutty little cookies rolled in powder sugar. Mmmm... Tastes like Christmas. :)

Chocolate Chip & Coconut Rum cookies! They are soo yummmy. I first tried them in the Cerromar Beach Hotel in Puerto Rico.. and I ended asking the waiter how to make them... they are easy to do and they don't last that long in my kitchen.

Homemade soft and warm chocolate chip BIG cookies. They have to be fresh and 5 min done out of the oven.

Yum!!!!

After toying around with a lot of different chocolate chip cookie recipes, I came up with "chewy chocolate-cherry-almond cookies" which are my new favorites.

Click here for my recipe.

Mom's triple chocolate chip. Lots of milk, semi-sweet, and white chocolate in a crispy outside-smooshy inside combination with a slight crispness to the bottom due to the supremely high sugar content.

I have to second the Italian not-coconut macaroons. Also gingerbread cookies (which shouldn't be so tethered to the winter), shortbread dipped in dark chocolate, and chocolate chip w/pecans.

Chocolate chip with nuts and coconut and dried cherries. And spritz cookies with plum or apricot jam filling, dipped in chocolate.

I don't believe I've ever met a chocolate chip cookie I didn't like. Plain, with nuts, raisins, coconut, oatmeal, and etc, etc. My very favorite!

I almost forgot...Browned Butter Shortbread Cookies. There was a recipe in Gourmet a couple of Christmases ago...they are really spectacular!

chocolate rugelach from Marzipan Bakery in Jerusalem. out of this world.

and who am i kidding, i love the oreos...

Macarons! But I suppose those would be considered confections of sorts... Otherwise it's chewy ginger cookies that are made with fresh ginger. Yum!

Nestle Toll House bar cookies! Yum!

I like peanut butter cookies best.

chocolate chip cookies...large semi sweet chocolate chunks...a la City Bakery

It's a tie between chocolate chip cookies and fudgy brownies, although whichever one I happened to be munching on at the moment might have a slight advantage!

Chocolate chip!

Easy..chocolate chip cookie. No two recipes are alike. I like mine with a lot of brown sugar and chocolate chips in them!

i love chocolate chip cookies

Pecan Pie Bars

Snickerdoodles -- soft and buttery with cinnamon and sugar. What a great combination!!!

Peanutbutter cookies with chocolate chips thrown in for good measure. When they are still warm I could eat a dozen.

Mmm.. rainbow cookies. Almondy chocolately goodness.

Okay, I'm picking one: HUGE chocolate chip cookies with walnuts, heavy on the chips and walnuts. However, I've rarely met a cookie I didn't like, especially if they're freshly homemade and maybe even still a little warm..... (drool)...

I like any chewy cookie. I really do not care for any cookie that is crisp. I feel as if the chewier cookie is more like homemade even if it comes from a box or carton. Except, perhaps for those ubiquitous GIRL SCOUT COOKIES!...those are an exception to my rule of preferring chewy over crisp. If you FORCED me to choose...I would have to say that a delicious, just warm from the oven CHEWY chocolate chip cookie would have to rate as the best. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to post this comment.

I think it is mean to chose a favorite cookie, because why discriminate all cookies? All should be loved equally. That said, if someone put a gun to my head and made me chose just one cookie, it would probably be oatmeal raisin.

I love the everythingbutthekitchensink cookies that were featured on Martha Steward. They are sooo chewy and are loaded with so many ingredients I can't name them all. I think you can still get the recipe on her web site.

I like cookies fine: I mean, I wouldn't say no to a cookie (unless it was something made from soy, grass, carob, pure unadulterated evil, and other "healthy" ingredients.) Chocolate Chip Cookies cannot be denied, truly.

But if you really want to make me squeal like a little girl on her birthday and mom and dad just got her a pony AND barbies - I'd have to say that the magical seven-layer bar is my super ultra favorite. When I used to work in Dupont Circle in WashDC, our office was right next to Firehook Bakery, home of the most bodacious 7-layer bars in the world. Every bite is a mouthful of coconut, chocolate, butterscotch and graham crackers (I could also swear on my not-dead-yet grandmother's grave that it also has condensed milk).

Each bite is like an enchanted trip through AWESOMELAND.

My favorite cookie is chocolate chip WITHOUT the choclate chips! LOL I use walnuts in mine instead. Yummy!

My favorite cookies are Italian almond macaroons, followed by choc. chip with oatmeal (both aparently quite popular with the other folks that have commented!)

My fave cookies are ginger creams - a cakey ginger & molasses cookie. there's just something about it that sets it apart from any other cookie!

Well, I don't know if brownies are considered cookies, but if they aren't, my favorite non-brownie cookie has to be chocolate chip.

Brownies are my favorite, the fudgier the better.

my nana's sugar cookies decorated to perfection : )

french macaroons! they are hard to find but sooo worth it! raspberry and pistachio, mmm. on the domestic front, oatmeal scotchies are delicious too--- oatmeal cookies with butterscotch chips.

I have a great recipe for Oatmeal Cookies made with brown sugar - Yummy! And I'm always a sucker for Spritz1

a sandwich of nutella cookies with fluff

My favorite cookies are macadamia chocolate chunk but I'll try any kind of cookies including potato chip cookies because I love cookies.

My late sister came up with an awesome chocolate chip oatmeal cookie that takes two hands to eat. The dough is so thick, your arms ache from trying to mix it all together...but that pain is well worth the results. Great warm!

My favorites have always been something we've called Margaret's Mess, after the cousin who gave us the recipe. They have oatmeal, cocoa, peanut butter, butter and some other things. They are wonderful!!

I love something called "Rocks" that we always make at Christmas. . .these are hearty molasses/cinnamon/raisin/pecan cookies and they are scrumptious!

Chocolate chip with pecans and semi-sweet chips warm from the oven

Tiny, crispy gingersnaps.