Tea Cookies

Lately it seems I've been missing some of my favorite recipes - unfortunately, I left a lot of them in my mom and dad's storage building, thinking that it would be hard to find the right ingredients for a lot of them. What a nice surprise it's been that I've been able to recreate quite a few of them here! (Thanks Mama for always being kind enough to dig out recipes for all those old family favorites when I fancy a taste from home!)

Earlier this week I started thinking about my Grandma's tea cakes. It seems (according to my memory) that she always had them ready to serve and we were always ready to gobble them up when my brother and I were children. My taste buds, which, of course, are working over time right now, started craving this childhood favorite. I, as usual, emailed my mom and asked her to send the recipe to me. And tonight I made my first batch of them. YUMMY!!!

I had been thinking of making them all day but wasn't sure I had quite enough energy to do so after dinner tonight. However, I knew Mark's tutor was coming over, and that gave me a little extra motivation because it's always the polite thing to offer some kind of food when serving tea to guests. Lucky him, he got some of the first pan full straight out of the oven! When I took the plate into the room where he and Mark were sitting, I explained that they are a favorite from my childhood and that the recipe comes from my grandmother. With that I left the two of them to chat and snack. When I went back to refill their tea cups, he asked for the name of the recipe. We call them tea "cakes," but if I had called something that looked so much like a cookie a "cake" he would have thought I was crazy! So . . . thinking fast on my feet, I gave them a new name . . . tea "cookies." He immediately explained how appropriate that name is because of how good they taste when eaten while drinking tea. He liked them so much that he wants me to give the recipe to his wife!

I don't know the history of this recipe, but it seems that whoever named it must have also been an avid tea drinker. At least, according to our friend, they couldn't have been called anything better!