Peanut Butter Cookies

With the cooling down of fall and the start of school...I felt like baking this week....well then again, I always feel like baking! It's a downfall and detriment to the waistline...but no one around here complains..

My grandma always made peanut butter cookies....I remember standing beside her, watching with amazement how she would hold the yellow mixing bowl just so, and stir with her wooden spoon...talking the whole time, telling me just how to make the perfect peanut butter cookies...and then we would roll them into balls and every once in a while she would let me eat a small piece of the dough...after all of the cookies were rolled into perfect spheres we would take a small fork...dusted it with flour (i have since substituted this for sugar....again-expanding waistline..) and very gently pressed a cross pattern on the cookies. When she placed them in the oven...I would 'help' do dishes and she would put the kettle on and make us tea to have with the cookies.

So as I made cookies this week...my little girl 'helped' with dishes, blond haired boy 'tested' the dough...and the tea was made for all..and then the tasting began!

Grandma Joan's Peanut Butter Cookies

1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Cream butter, add sugars, beat until creamy. Mix in other ingredients and blend flour slowly.
Roll into small balls, and place on a greased cookie sheet. Press the balls flat with a floured fork.. Bake in a moderate oven....350 degrees for 10-12 minutes.

yield 4 1/2 dozen