Bake a Difference and Be A Good Cookie

Prepare yourself.  December is shaping up to be a month full of cookies here at 1840 Farm.  I will make no apologies for tempting you with photos of decadent looking cookie treats in the coming weeks.  I will not shy away from posting recipes for batches of cookie dough that involve Julia Child-like quantities of butter.  Consider yourself warned.

Somehow, cookies always find their way into our kitchen each December.  It seems that there is always an opportunity to use a cookie to help celebrate the season.  There are office luncheons, cookie exchanges, hungry visitors, and the plate of cookies left for Santa on the evening of his epic journey.

No matter the reason, cookies inevitably remind me of the holiday seasons of my childhood.  Those years will filled with trays of beautiful cookies lovingly baked by my Grandmother.  She loved to fill each tray with cookies of every kind from rugelach to chocolate crinkles and everywhere in between.

Now that my children are old enough to be making their own lifelong holiday memories, I know that theirs will be colored by time spent with their Grandmother making sugar cookies to leave for Santa.  Of course, a few cookies will find their way to our counter and be enjoyed well before December 24th in the name of quality control.  These memories are the kind of gift that will stay with them long after the tree and tinsel have been packed away until the next holiday season.

This year, we have an extra reason to make sure that there are always cookies on the counter at 1840 Farm.  We were honored to be selected to help OXO  and OXO Good Cookies raise awareness and much-needed funds to support Cookies for Kids’ Cancer.  Cookies for Kids’ Cancer was started by two OXO employees after their son was diagnosed with cancer.  When they learned that 25% of children diagnosed with cancer don’t survive due to a lack of funding to develop more effective pediatric therapies, they took action and Cookies for Kids’ Cancer was born.

Cookies for Kids’ Cancer raises capital through a variety of activities.  They sell gourmet cookie gift packages, cookbooks filled with cookie recipes, and encourage people to hold bake sales and donate their earnings to the cause.  Their site www.cookiesforkidscancer.org offers a wealth of information as to how we can all help them meet their goal to “make the letter C mean cookies.”

In order to inspire us to get baking, OXO has provided me with a limited edition “be a good cookie” cookie spatula to give away to one lucky reader.  The spatulas can be found at your local OXO retailer or online through Amazon.  For each spatula sold, OXO will donate 50% of the profits, up to $100,000, to Cookies for Kids’ Cancer.  Until December 31, they will also match all proceeds from registered bake sales, up to $100,000.  These spatulas would make a perfect stocking stuffer for someone on your shopping list who loves to bake.  In fact, a few of them just might find their way under our Christmas tree this year.

I hope that you will gather together with family and friends to “bake a difference” with all of us here at 1840 Farm whether that involves holding a fundraising bake sale or simply spending a little time together in your kitchen.  I am a firm believer that involving yourself in either activity will brighten your holiday season.  Each time we lift a homemade cookie, we’ll be reminded that we can all bake a difference and be a good cookie in our homes and our communities.

In my next post, I’ll be sharing all the details on how you can enter for a chance to win the coveted green spatula.  I’ll also include a cookie recipe to inspire you to start your cookie baking.  I’ll keep sharing a new cookie recipe every few days as we march through the month of December.

In the end, we’ll all gain something whether it be a spatula or a new, delicious cookie recipe just in time for our holiday celebrations.  As an added bonus, we’ll help raise awareness for pediatric cancer research.  Maybe some day Cookies for Kids’ Cancer will meet their goal of helping to provide more effective therapies for children with Cancer.  Then more children will be able to make their own holiday cookie memories.  I think that’s something that we can all raise a cookie for.