Cookies. What is it about cookies? Various people turn up their noses at liver, broccoli, clams, meat, vegetables, eggs, custard, pies - but I never heard anybody say they don't like cookies.

The first cookies I remember were gingerbread cookies - the kind that look like little boys and girls. My mom made them, and my brother and I helped decorate them. I used to love them, but haven't eaten one in probably twenty years at least. After my mom became a single parent she never had time for making cookies any more. She took to buying the occasional tray of cookies from the supermarket. Pecan sandies, windmill cookies, vanilla wafers, chocolate chips, oreos. The pecan sandies were great, but in general the storebought cookies didn't compare to the homemade ones I remembered that my mom made. But they were gone - except at Christmas. Then she'd still go all out, making perhaps a dozen kinds that she would set out for guests and family over the holidays and give to friends. Some of them were pretty awful - all for looks, not for taste! As a kid, I didn't care how they looked, and couldn't figure out why she wanted to make those cornflake wreaths - but in fact, they did look nice. But others she made were great, and they didn't last long on the plates after I spotted them.

One year in grad school I was home alone for several weeks, and having nothing to do decided to make cookies and send them to my friends at school. It was quite an undertaking - my mother had never let me use her electric beater, but nobody was there to say "No," and I went after the recipes from The Joy of Cooking with a vengeance. The ones I made were quite a hit - grad students don't see too many cookies. In the years since, I've rarely made anything other than Tollhouse Chocolate Chip Cookies from the recipe on the chocolate chip bags - and never been very happy with those results. Yet for the longest time, whenever I would happen across a cookbook with cookie recipes, I would buy it, thinking someday I would make a lot of great cookies.

A few weeks ago I decided I might think about once again making holiday cookies for Christmas. I did make a few kinds, and they turned out pretty well. It has prompted me to bring up my cookbooks from boxes in the basement, and make a list of the cookie recipes with their ingredients. A list of over 1400 cookie and bar recipes has resulted, far more than I dreamed it might be. I did an experiment with a very basic butter cookie, varying certain parts of the process and ingredients and found some things make a big difference in the result. I wonder - how do you make the perfect cookie?

Of course, there is no perfect cookie. As a friend pointed out, one person's bad cookie is another person's great cookie! Some people like crisp cookies, and some like soft ones. Some like candied fruits, and others hate them. There's an endless list of preferences. But still, what makes a cookie a "good cookie"? I used to think you can't really go wrong with flour, butter, and sugar, but in my butter cookie experiment I proved myself oh so wrong! A lot of those cookies found their way to the garbage - I didn't want to eat them, and if I'd given them away I would have felt like I was foisting off bad cookies on unsuspecting innocents who would feel obligated to thank me. No, no, no. I have decided to start making cookies regularly, try different things, and share what I find with other novice cookie-makers out there, if anybody is interested. I don't imagine I'll be making all 1400+ recipes I have. That would take four years if I made a different cookie every day! Not going to happen, much as I'd love to do it. I'm not sure how far I'll go with this - only time will tell. Just tonight I saw the delightful movie Julie & Julia, and leaving the show thought, "Why not a cookie blog?" I would never be up to all the recipes in Julia Child's cookbook, but cookies? Well, I'm sure there are other cookie blogs out there, but what the heck. So here goes.