Gooey Nog'n Cookies, created by Tom Emmans, won the Post-Dispatch 2020 Holiday Cookie Contest. Photo by Tom Emmans.
Brown Butter Pecan Sandies, submitted by Sue Ward, were a winner in the Post-Dispatch 2020 Holiday Cookie Contest. Photo by Sue Ward.
What if you could take the flavor of egg nog, put it in a cookie and give it the texture of gooey butter cake?
If you’re Tom Emmans of Brentwood, you would win the People’s Choice Award in the 2020 Post-Dispatch Holiday Cookie Contest.
Emmans’ winning entry, Gooey Nog’n Cookies, cleverly mimics the taste of egg nog by adding rum flavoring and nutmeg to instant pudding. The gooey butter cake — or rather, gooey butter cookie — effect is achieved with equal parts of butter and cream cheese, plus powdered sugar mixed with granulated sugar.
“I kind of played with this one,” Emmans said. “I have a pumpkin gooey butter recipe that I really like, and I was trying to make something other than pumpkin. And I like egg nog.”
Emmans is a professional chef; he works at the Art of Entertaining catering and carryout place in Webster Groves. His mother taught him how to bake, he said, and it comes naturally to him. He usually gets hired as a cook, but when his employers learn that he can bake they usually ask him also to do some baking.
As always, the competition for the cookie contest was stiff. The Gooey Nog’n Cookies won by a head over Neapolitan Christmas Cookies, which were submitted by Marilyn McDougal.
McDougal said she has been cooking these holiday favorites for as long as she has been married. That’s almost 51 years.
Though they are just simple sugar cookies, they have a Neopolitan twist — and that’s what makes all the difference.
Inspired by Neopolitan ice cream, they have three layers of color: brown, white and red. The brown layer adds just a bit of melted unsweetened chocolate and walnuts to it; the white layer is untouched; and the red layer is just colored with a bit of red food coloring.
It is a pretty and unfussy cookie, although it takes two days to make. It is sturdy, too, so it is easy to send in the mail, McDougal said.
If you do send it in the mail, be sure to mention the part about it taking two days to make, as well as the part about it coming in second place in this cookie contest. The happy recipients will be duly impressed.
Chocolatey Caramel Thumbprints, submitted by Georgia Schaljo, were winners in both the People's Choice and the Juried Competition categories of the Post-Dispatch 2020 Holiday Cookie Contest. Photo by Georgia Schaljo.
Third place went to Chocolaty Caramel Thumbprints, which were submitted by Georgia Schaljo. These differ from traditional thumbprint cookies in two ways, the chocolaty way and the caramel way.
Thumbprint cookies are usually butter cookies with a fruit jam or a Hershey’s Kiss in an indentation in the center. But these begin with chocolate cookies, and the indentation is filled with candy caramels melted with a little cream. And then, if the cookie seems too much like an ungilded lily, melted chocolate is then drizzled across the top.
Meanwhile, the same entries were also judged by a panel of all the staff food writers at the Post-Dispatch.
In their judgment, the winner was Busy Bee Cookies, submitted by Diane Ellenberger of St. Louis. These are oatmeal cookies studded heavily with cherries, coconut, raisins and pecans.
These cookies are a St. Louis tradition; according to Ellenberger, the recipe comes from the old Busy Bee Bakery, which had several locations in downtown St. Louis in the 1920s.
Ellenberger said the recipe took a twisted road to get to her. Her aunt knew a woman whose mother worked at the bakeries. The recipe wended its way from her to Ellenberger’s grandmother, to her mother and finally to her. Now that it has won the Post-Dispatch cookies contest, it can be known to everyone and the Busy Bee tradition can continue.
Second place in the juried competition went to Brown Butter Pecan Sandies, which are familiar pecan sandies but with browned butter, which makes them taste even nuttier; the recipe comes from Sue Ward.
Third place was won by Schaljo and the same Chocolaty Caramel Thumbprints that also took third place in the Audience Choice Awards.
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December 02, 2020 at 03:45AM
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