Persimmon Cookie Recipe, Best Ever!! Happy Holidays

Hello and Happy Holidays!

My friends and neighbors Steve and Sharon have a magnificent 20 tall persimmon tree with huge and beautiful persimmons.  This year, as every year, I've received a bag full of newly harvested persimmons.  I want to share this favorite cookie recipe.

If you haven't made anything with persimmons before you are in for a treat.  These are cake-like drop cookies with a delicate flavor probably closest to pumpkin only better.  They freeze very well and we enjoy them through the spring. Enjoy!

Michelle Paganini’s Persimmon Cookie Recipe (doubles well)

Note: Use the larger persimmons with a pointed end (not doughnut shaped).  They need to be very ripe, translucent under the skin and mushy to the touch or the cookies will be dry and bitter.  Ease the skin off leaving as much pulp as possible -or- if they are ripe enough (completely translucent) you can pull the stem off and squeeze the insides out of the stem hole.

In a large mixing bowl:

Mash 2 cups ripe persimmon to a pulp
   (2-4 depending on size) (it is okay if some strips of persimmon remain) 

Add in:

1 tsp baking powder

2 tsp salt

2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp cloves

1 tsp nutmeg     and mix well. 

Note:  Make certain there are no lumps in the baking soda or powder before you mix.

Mix remaining ingredients in the order given:

2 cuts nuts (optional, but not according to my husband)

2 cuts raisins (optional, but not according to my daughter)

2 cups sugar

2 beaten eggs

1 cup of oil or melted butter

4 cups of flour* 

*Stop and check the dough at 3.75 cups, the dough needs to be somewhat stiff, but not so stiff that utensils stand upright in it. You can also try baking one cookie.  If the dough is just right the cookie will spread out a bit as it is cooking.

Spoon cookie dough onto ungreased (or parchment lined) cookie sheets and bake in a preheated oven at 350^o ~14 minutes or until golden on top.  If they are not a bit golden/brown on top the flavor is not as good.  The recipe doubles perfectly. The cookies freeze very well (separate with wax paper). Enjoy!

*While you are ripening them, place them stem side down on a newspaper lined cookie tray at room temperature. It can take weeks for them to ripen, so I leave them in the garage.