Andrea’s 1st Note: If it’s close to Christmastime and you’re planning to make these cookies for Christmas, add a few more drops of green food coloring to the Cool Whip mixture so that your cookies will be Christmas colors, red from the cherries you’ll place on top of each cookie and green from the food coloring in the dough.
When your cookie dough has chilled and you’re ready to bake, preheat your oven to 350 degrees F., and make sure the rack is in the middle position. DO NOT take your chilled cookie dough out of the refrigerator until your oven has reached the proper temperature.
While your oven is preheating, prepare your cookie sheets by spraying them with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray, or lining them with parchment paper.
Place the confectioner’s sugar in a small, shallow bowl. You will be dropping cookie dough into this bowl to form dough balls and coating them with the powdered sugar.
When your oven is ready, take your dough out of the refrigerator. Using a teaspoon from your silverware drawer, drop the dough by rounded teaspoonful into the bowl with the powdered sugar. Roll the dough around with your fingers to form powdered-sugar-coated cookie dough balls.
Hannah’s 5th Note: This is easiest if you coat your fingers with powdered sugar first and then try to form the cookie dough into balls. When your fingers get covered with dough, simply wash them off under running water. It also helps if you put no more than one dough ball in the powdered sugar at a time. It gives you more room to roll and it keeps unrolled dough balls from sticking to each other.
Place the sugared cookie dough balls on your prepared cookie sheets, no more than 12 cookies on a standard-size sheet.
If you haven’t already done so, cut your maraschino cherries in half and place one half, rounded side up, on top of each cookie ball on your baking sheet.
Andrea’s 2nd Note: Make only as many cookie dough balls as you can bake at one time and then cover the dough and return it to the refrigerator. I have a double oven so I prepare 2 sheets of cookies at a time.
Bake your Spumoni Whippersnapper Cookies at 350 degrees F., for 10 to 12 minutes. Test for doneness by tapping them lightly with a finger to see if they’re “set.”
Let your cookies cool on the cookie sheet for 2 minutes, and then move them to a wire rack to cool completely.
(This is a lot easier if you line your cookie sheets with parchment paper. Then all you have to do is grab one end of the parchment paper and pull it, cookies and all, onto the wire rack.)
Once the cookies are completely cool, store them between sheets of waxed paper in a cool, dry place. (Your refrigerator is cool, but it’s definitely not dry!)
Yield: 3 to 4 dozen soft, chewy cookies. Your yield will depend on cookie size.
Chapter Four
Hannah heard someone coming up the outside staircase and she hurried to open the door. It was Norman and he was carrying two kitty crates. “Hi, Norman. I’m so glad you’re here! Come in!”
Norman stepped in and immediately set the two kitty carriers down on the rug. “They’re not too happy about being in the carriers,” he told her.
“They never are,” Hannah said, noticing that both Moishe and Norman’s cat, Cuddles, looked less than happy in their crates.
“You’re home, Moishe!” she greeted her pet. Even though she hadn’t mentioned it to Ross, she’d missed Moishe the whole time they’d been gone.
Moishe gave her a pathetic look behind the screen of his crate. Then he yowled the most plaintive yowl that Hannah had ever heard.
“Sorry about that, Big Guy,” Norman said to Moishe. “You’ll be out of there in just a minute.”
He waved at the others assembled at the table and turned back to Hannah. “Mike and Lonnie will be here in a couple of seconds. They were pulling in just as I reached the top of the stairs.”
Moishe gave another yowl and Hannah put her hand on the crate, preparing to let him out. “Sit down, everyone,” she warned her family. “Moishe wants out and I’m not quite sure where he’s going to run first.” Then she turned to Norman. “If you let Cuddles out at the same time, maybe it won’t be as hectic.”
As Hannah waited, Norman prepared to raise the wire grate on his crate. “Okay. Ready . . . set . . . go!”
Hannah and Norman raised the two screens at the same moment and the cats rushed out. To Hannah’s surprise, Moishe didn’t race down the hallway as he usually did when he was released from his carrier. Instead, he made a bee-line for Hannah and jumped up into her arms.
Even though Hannah was ready, she still had to take a step backwards. Luckily, she caught her balance.
“Are you all right, Hannah?” Ross asked, hurrying to her side.
“I’m fine.” Hannah replied, nuzzling the top of Moishe’s furry head.
“I don’t know about you, but I’d say Moishe missed you,” Norman commented.
“I guess he did,” Hannah gasped, still recovering from the twenty-three pound orange and white bundle of feline that she’d managed to catch.
“Do you want me to take him?” Ross offered, realizing that Hannah was a bit short on breath.
“No, that’s okay. Let’s see how he likes the back of the new couch.”
Hannah walked over to the couch and placed Moishe on the back of the closest of the new leather couches.
“Will he scratch it?” Delores asked, sounding a bit nervous about that possibility.
Hannah smiled, watching her pet settle down on the soft leather and start to purr. “I don’t think so, unless it happens to be made out of mouse hide.”
“Of course it’s not!” Delores looked horrified at the suggestion. “These couches are made of . . .” she paused and turned to Andrea. “What did the salesman say, dear?”