Seasonal snack

Is there anything that signals the start of the holiday season more than Christmas cookies warm from the oven? Not to me there isn't. Neither the decorations hovering over Broadway and Main streets nor the sound of holiday music wafting through the mall better represents the spirit of the season, as far as I'm concerned. I agree with Rose Levy Beranbaum, who observes in her beautiful cookbook on the subject, "There is a reason the word 'cookie' follows 'Christmas' with such inevitability."

Sandy Moore of Cape Girardeau, an inveterate cookie baker with 32 years of experience baking the treats, must surely agree. This time of year she is busy baking holiday cookies virtually every night of the week. What is more, thanks to her, hundreds of college students from some 60 countries around the world must feel like it is Christmas all year long.

That's because every Sunday the Baptist Student Center on the Southeast Missouri State University campus invites international students to have dinner in the A.B. Cooper Dining Room (named after the center's first director, the late father of retired university alumni director and Facebook fanatic Jane Stacy). Sometimes the meals consist of typical American fare and sometimes they feature various ethnic cuisines, which the students help to prepare, but every other week the best things on the table are the cookies which Sandy, affectionately dubbed "The Cookie Lady," generously provides.

In so doing, Sandy is introducing foreign students to America's take on a centuries-old treat that, like so many wonderful culinary inventions -- fudge and puff pastry among them -- was stumbled upon by accident. The first cookie was actually a small amount of cake batter used to test baking temperature back in the days when cakes were cooked over a fire. Thus, our word "cookie" comes from the Dutch word "koekje," which means "little cake." Just think what the world would be missing had early ovens been capable of the precise regulation of temperature typical of modern ones -- the cookie might never have been invented.

Fortunately for us, and for the lucky people who regularly sample Sandy Moore's cookies, it was. In fact, Sandy's foray into the world of cookies sort of parallels the creation of the cookie itself. She started out with cakes, but after an early disaster so frustrating that she couldn't resist putting her fist through the finished product, she turned to smaller endeavors, namely cookies.

This plate of eggnog cookies is a specialty of Sandy Moore of Cape Girardeau, who this time of year is baking such treats virtually every night of the week in preparation for the holidays. (TOM HARTE)

At this time of year those endeavors offer us a valuable lesson in how to avoid the commercialization of Christmas by recapturing the magic of the season through the magnanimous giving of homemade cookies.

Eggnog Cookies

When she isn't baking cookies, Sandy Moore is judicial assistant to Judge Stephen N. Limbaugh Jr. These delectable cookies (originally developed by Cheryl Reinagel of Kelso, Missouri), which Sandy brings to the courthouse often, have become his honor's favorite. Having recently gobbled up several of these mouthwatering morsels in a single sitting, I find no grounds to warrant an appeal to the decision handed down from the bench.

• 1 cup, 3 tablespoons softened butter, divided
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla, divided
• 1/4 teaspoon grated fresh nutmeg
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups flour
• Coarse sugar
• 1 cup, 2 tablespoons powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon brandy

Beat one cup butter and granulated sugar at medium speed until well combined. Add egg yolk, 1 teaspoon vanilla, nutmeg and salt and mix well. Add flour at low speed until combined. Pat dough into a rectangle, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least one hour. On lightly floured surface, roll chilled dough to a thickness of 1/8 inch and cut with a square or round fluted cookie cutter. Cut a 1/2-inch hole in the center of half of the unbaked cookies and place them on a parchment-lined sheet. Place remaining unbaked cookies on another parchment-lined sheet. Sprinkle all with coarse sugar and bake at 350 degrees for 9 to 11 minutes, until lightly browned only on the bottoms. (Cookies with holes will bake slightly faster.) Beat remaining 3 tablespoons butter, powdered sugar, brandy and remaining teaspoon of vanilla until thoroughly combined. When completely cooled, sandwich filling between cookies, placing pierced cookies on top.