NOT-SO-EASY RECIPE: Pumpkin Snickerdoodle Cookies

Okay, I have to admit -- for all my shortcut-taking in the kitchen, one place I like to overachieve is the cookie department. I love cookies. Nom nom nom cookies. I don't care if it takes me three hours to bake, because the reward (face full of cookie) is worth it.

On the flip side, I hate being disappointed by cookie recipes. Which is what I've been with every pumpkin cookie recipe to date. And because my obsession with cookies is rivaled by my obsession with pumpkin, I have tried a lot of cookie recipes in an attempt to unite these two amazing tastes in my belly.

But...I'VE FOUND A RECIPE I LIKE!

This is adapted from Annie's Eats -- very, very closely adapted. Basically, all I did differently was to skip the salt and go a little light on the flour.

You'll need...

FOR THE COOKIES:

• 3 3/4 cups of flour (I went a little light on each cup)
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 2 sticks of unsalted butter, softened (NOT melted!)
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup dark brown sugar (light's okay too; I just prefer dark)
• 3/4 cup pumpkin puree
• 1 egg
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

FOR THE COATING:

• 1/2 cup granulated white sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon (I went heavy because I LOVE cinnamon)
• 1/2 tsp ginger
• a shake or two of allspice

Hold on one sec...I just have to take a quick bite of the pumpkin...

...okay. Yum. Seriously, sprinkle a little brown sugar on it and it's like a tiny pumpkin pie!

Anyway.

Mix the cookie ingredients together, starting with the dry stuff, then adding the wet stuff. Use a hand mixer on the lowest setting or else you'll get powdered George Washington-style by flour. It's nearly impossible to mix. Your mixer will make sad machine sounds, and the batter will crawl up the little blade thingies, and you'll have to scrape it off, and then it'll just happen again. Stick with it!

Eff you, batter.

Once the batter is mixed, stir the ingredients for the coating in a small bowl. Roll the batter into 1" to 1 1/2" balls, then dip the balls* in the coating and place them on an ungreased cookie sheet.

To make sure they cook evenly, you'll want to smush them a little bit. In lieu of getting sticky hands, run a glass under some cold water, then dip it in the coating.

Now use it to smush the cookies. Ta-da! Love this trick -- I think I like this Annie girl.

Now bake the cookies at 350 degrees for 12 minutes. 

Perfection. Not too cakey, not too soft or mushy, not too buttery, just perfect cookie consistency. I'm bringing these to my family reunion tomorrow, so my short-term goal is to not eat the entire batch before we get there. My long-term goal is to not eat the entire batch while we're there, even if it's fair game once it hits the dessert table.

It took me longer to write this recipe than it usually takes me to prep an entire dinner, but if you ever have an hour of free time -- today's serendipity was a long nap from my two-year-old and an excessively cooperative mood from my one-year-old -- these cookies are worth the trouble.

*LOL.