Persimmon Ginger Holiday Cookies

Photo: Four Seasons Hotel Seattle

Ingredients

1/2 cup shortening

1 cup white sugar

1 egg

2 cups flour

teaspoon ½ baking soda

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cloves

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

2 tablespoons heaping finely chopped crystallized ginger

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

cup 1 persimmon puree

1/4 cup powdered sugar

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream shortening and sugar together.

Add egg and mix well.

In a large bowl mix flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cloves, cinnamon and nutmeg.

Sift into the creamed sugar and mix well.

Add chopped ginger, walnuts, vanilla and persimmon puree. Mix until smooth. Drop in heaping teaspoonfuls on a parchment lined cookie sheet.

Bake 13-15 minutes or until tops are just turning golden. Should have a cake or muffin like texture.

Dust with powdered sugar, or use to make ice cream sandwiches with pumpkin pie ice cream!

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About

Note: This recipe was submitted by Diana Johnson to the Four Seasons Hotel Seattle's Ultimate Holiday Cookie Contest.

When I imagine holiday cookies I think of soft, chewy, and delightfully spicy persimmon cookies. As a small child in North Carolina we had a bounty of persimmon trees in our back yards. I would pretend to be a pioneer who only had the food I could gather to eat. I'd collect as many persimmons as I could and scoop out their flesh. I'd eat it until I was a sticky mess, and we would puree the rest and freeze it. A couple weeks later we would use the puree to make cookies and we'd give them out when we Christmas caroled friends and neighbors. I don't know the exact recipe we used, but I've recently created my own version that brings back so many fun childhood memories. I can't wait to pass it along to my children one day.