Sour Cream Cookies or "Jumbles"

Here's a recipe of memory. These cookies aren't just easy to make and delicious, but they've proven themselves to be curative. These simple cake-like treats catapulted me from of a month of listlessness, weight loss and lethargy into taste of memory, igniting a renewed appetite. In my small, dispersed family, these sour cream cookies have become iconic and revered. I've made them for special occasions: camp and college visits, birthdays, get well visits and trips abroad.

They're pillows of easy-to-consume, easy-to-dunk-or-not-dunk, uncomplicated and straightforward "cakies". Bake them for your toddler, your Grandma or your pickiest eater. No nuts, no seeds, no chocolate or booze or esoteric spices or flavorings.

When my Grandma Bessie came from her apartment in the Bronx, or later from her condominium in Florida for a visit, these were always brought along. When she pulled in, our uncontrollable English Setter would snap to attention and sit motionless, paralyzed with drool oozing from one jowl, waiting for Bessie to slip him a cookie. Alfie was a smart cookie.

Until recently I've been the only descendant who has been able to replicate (and I'm sure that by now, they're nothing like the original "Bessie's") these cookies. Bessie spent time with me, showing me her method. She told me that the original recipe (she didn't remember where it came from) was called "Sour Cream Jumbles". I found this recipe, almost exact, on "Cooks.com", but butter wasn't specified - just 'shortening', nor was it finished with cinnamon/sugar (which makes everything taste good in an Eastern European Jewish sort of way.

When my daughter was very little, my Grandmother came to our house and demonstrated "la technique". (Check out the 'Shifty sifter'!)

Not too long ago, my daughter baked a batch and nailed them.

My Daughter's Batch - beautiful!

I asked her if she'd channeled "Bessie energy" and she confirmed that she had. The trick to these is working quietly and deliberately and with intent. It's no different than just about most things one encounters in work and life. My daughter possesses this fine quality ... hence, the cookies (and oh, yes, so much more).

Bessie was exacting about everything she did. She was a petite brickhouse.
Her baking was consistently good - nothing complicated, but always well-executed. Bessie was gentile, slim, put together with a perfectly trained pin curl. Her annual Thanksgiving feast was always perfect, served on her Limoges china; and she always spent hours fussing over her famous mushroom-barley-lima bean and vegetable soup. She made perfect blintzes, great pumpkin bread, and nobody's been able to duplicate her prune roll (I've come close, but still, no cigar.)

She appeared patient, intent, intense and I imagine was self-reflecting, if not critical, demanding, both of herself (and I can only imagine, those who were close). I don't think she ever said an unkind word to me. As she grew older, she did a good deal of philanthropic work.

Time to release these sour cream cookies from the family treasure trove. Maybe they'll become part of your family's comfort food legacy.

If you have a recipe to share that's part of your family's trove, I'd love to hear from you. Send me your comments, feedback or recipes at blueheronkitchen@gmail.com

From the heron's bully pulpit: don't underestimate the healing power of taste memories, tradition and the comfort food brings to bumps in the road. Honor, appreciate and cherish your family that "feeds" you. 

peace and love,
jane

Sour Cream Cookies or "Jumbles"

Adapted from Bess Beckerman by Blue Heron Kitchen

Dedicated to my Daughter

Ingredients:

3 ½ cups all-purpose flour, scooped and leveled (King Arthur, Bob's Red Mill or Hecker's)

½ tsp. Kosher salt

½ tsp. baking powder (Try Rumford’s and make sure it's fresh!)

½ tsp. baking soda

½ cup (4 oz.) unsalted butter, at room temperature (Land O Lakes is fine!)

1 ½ cups granulated sugar

2 eggs, size large, at room temperature

1 cup thick sour cream (I like Breakstone's. Don't skimp on low fat - not here.)

1 tsp. pure vanilla extract (Look for Baldwin's Vanilla online!)

Cinnamon/sugar for topping (1/4 c. sugar : 1 tsp. cinnamon)

Procedure:

Line two (or three, if you have) baking sheets with parchment paper. If you don't have parchment paper, you should get some. If you don't get some, melt some butter and butter the sheets (you can use a pastry brush to do this quickly and without making a mess.)

Preheat oven to 375º F. (My Grandmother's recipe calls for a much hotter - 425º F. - oven. I've seen recipes for a 400º oven. At 375º, these will take time to bake. You can play around with temperature. What matters is that you don't let these become crisp or burn!)

In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda. Set aside.

Measure sugar and set aside.

Measure sour cream and set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream butter well, add sugar gradually and mix well until light and fluffy.

Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each one.

Blend in vanilla extract.

Beginning with flour mixture, alternate flour, sour cream, flour, sour cream, ending with flour, mixing well after each addition. (When you alternate wet, dry ingredients, always end with dry.)

Be sure to scrape down beater blade, sides and bottom and incorporate all ingredients.

Drop by rounded spoonfuls about 1 ½”  inches apart on parchment lined baking sheets.  Sprinkle each spoonful, generously, with cinnamon sugar. 

Bake for about 12-18 minutes in hot oven, rotating sheets, top to bottom and front to back. Cookies are done when the bottoms are browned and tops are slightly colored.

Cool on racks and then store in airtight container. They will take on a cake-like texture. "Cakies".

Yield: approx. 4-5 dozen

This just in!: My nephew, who lives in Western Australia shared his exciting news that he splurged and bought his first Kitchen Aid! (It's criminal how much he had to pay down under.)
No surprise that after he cracked his first bottle on it, he pulled out his beater blade and baked a batch of these sour cream cookies! Another offspring with the genetic material. Hurray for Jacob!

Jacob's Sour Cream Cookies, baked with inborn talent and love.