In America, a cookie is describe as a thin, sweet, small cake; in Australia and the United Kingdom it is called a biscuit.
The first historic record of cookies was their use as test cakes. A small amount of cake batter was baked to test the oven temperature. The name cookies is derived from the Dutch work koekje, meaning "little cake". The English, Scotch, and Dutch immigrants originally brought the first cookie to the United States. Our simple butter cookies strongly resemble the English teacakes and the Scottish shortbread.
The Southern American colonial housewife took great pride in her cookies, almost always called simply "tea cakes". These were often flavored with nothing more than the finest butter, sometimes with the addition of a few drops of rose water. |
