The Best Peanut Butter Cookies Ever

This recipe is easy, makes a lot, and my boys were raised on it. I got it from a book called More Family Favorites by Miriam B. Loo. In fact, you can tell this is my favorite recipe in the entire book because while the PB Cookie page looks splotched, stained, folded, spindled, and torn like this:

the whole rest of the book looks like this:

I got it a bazillion years ago from a Current catalog and while I LOVE the PB Cookies and use the recipe all the time, I also like the rest of the book for its old-timey penny-pinching recipes that feed a crowd.

So here's the cookie recipe in its entirety - and I follow it religiously (Pssht - just kidding!):

PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES

"A very common cookie, but this recipe is especially good."

1 cup butter or margarine                            1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup granulated sugar                                2 eggs

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar               2 teaspoons baking soda

1 cup chunky peanut butter                        3 cups all-purpose flour

Heat oven to 375 degrees F. Cream butter or margarine with sugars. Add peanut butter and vanilla; blend well. Mix in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Sift baking soda with flour and stir into creamed mixture. Roll dough into small balls; place on greased cookie sheet and flatten slightly with a dinner fork. Bake for 10-12 minutes.

Makes 8 to 9 dozen

But this is how I do it:

I use all the ingredients as listed above except I ALWAYS use butter in cookies 'cause I think margarine is nasty.

For the instruction part, I do it like this:

Heat oven to 375 degrees F. Dump all dry ingredients in large bowl and whisk to mix. Put 1 cup butter into Pyrex measuring cup and microwave 30 seconds or so because I forgot to bring it to room temp. Make a well in the dry ingredients and dump the wet ingredients in there. Mix well with hands. It forms a nice dry-ish, dough that doesn't stick to your hands. Place slightly flattened golf ball-sized bits of dough onto ungreased cookie sheet ('cause it's got enough butter in it so it doesn't stick) and bake 10-12 minutes. I usually don't bother to make fork marks in them and I sometimes add stuff like nuts or chocolate chips. AND it's super easy to double and triple the batches because of the ingredient amounts (ie. 1 cup, 1 cup, 2 eggs, etc.). 

Today is BIL's birthday party so I'm making a nice, big batch for him. He's so hard to get for - but he's got a sweet tooth (or two) and that really helps me out.

BTW, made my way, this recipe makes nowhere near 8-9 dozen. More like 3 dozen. Better double it!