Coconut Cookies with Lemon Icing

Please notice how dark it is in these photographs...all of a sudden I am finding myself getting ready for work in the middle of the night. When did that happen?! I made these cookies late in the evening, and figured I would photograph them in the morning before taking them to work so I could have better light. Apparently that won't be an option anymore. Luckily I left two cookies at home, and got a couple more pictures the next day.





















I have future plans for these cookies. I could never duplicate them exactly even if I wanted to because there were so many mishaps, (such as tripping while measuring in the almond extract.) But the fact of the matter is that they were too labor intensive with the rolling, etc, anyway. I am thinking they might work as a refrigerator slice and bake cookies, with more spices to go with the cinnamon, and then sandwich them with something creamy. Okay, I will confess, I secretly want to duplicate Mother's Taffy Sandwich Cookies. I think these are on the right track, and I will revisit them the next time I am inspired to work on this endeavor. But that may be awhile, because now I also have major negative associations with these cookies. I took them to work, and ate one-too-many, which left me feeling a little gross late in the afternoon. Then my day proceeded to turn into one of my Top 3 Most Sad and Heinous Days At Work Ever. I almost couldn't bring myself to post about these cookies because of it, but really, they are just cookies, and good ones at that. So here they are.

The original recipe came from Big Fat Cookies, by Elinor Klivans. The unadulterated cookies were fabulous - nice and crispy-crunchy. And they tasted wonderful with the lemon icing, but it caused them to become chewy cookies, which is not what I wanted at all. Does anyone out there know how to avoid that in the future? I want a frosted cookie that is also crunchy...

Toasted Coconut Washboards

- 1 1/2 cups sweetened shredded coconut, toasted in a 300 degree oven for about 10 minutes (stir occasionally, and watch closely)
- 2 cups flour
- 3/4 tsp baking powder
- heaping 1/8 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon (I used 1/4 tsp, and regretted reducing it)
- 3/4 cup butter at room temperature
- 1 cup packed brown sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1/2 tsp almond extract

Oven to 350 degrees. Mix together dry ingredients in a medium bowl. Beat together butter and brown sugar until fluffy, then add the egg, vanilla, and almond extract, and beat until blended. Mix in flour, then coconut.

The dough is soft, and the recipe calls for rolling it to 1/4 inch thickness between sheets of wax paper, then slicing the cookies into rectangles, and transferring the cookies to the cookie sheets. I did it, but I won't be doing it again. It was a royal pain in the ass. Bake until edges are golden, about 15 minutes. Cool on sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to wire rack.

Lemon Icing

- lemon juice
- lemon zest
- powdered sugar

Mix until spreadable, and spread on cookies.