Cookie Home

Posting my cookie recipes this past week made me think about cookie jars.

One of my sisters pointed out to me that I have always had a cookie jar. So did my mother, which is surprising in that I don’t have memories of my mom making homemade cookies very often. My father, as I have mentioned, was a baker, and made, among many delicious baked items, cookies. It wasn’t surprising then that my mother was an infrequent cookie maker. Still, she had the cookie jar. Doesn’t everybody, I wondered?

I began to survey friends and family about whether or not they have, or grew up with, a cookie jar. To my surprise, neither of my sisters had cookie jars. “Where did you keep your cookies?” I asked one of them. Tupperware or plastic bags was her answer. The lack of a cookie jar doesn't seem to have impacted her children negatively. My other sister said she rarely made homemade cookies because she worked full time. Still, cookies don’t have to be homemade to deserve a cookie jar. However, her children also seem to be normal citizens who contribute to society.

One of my best childhood memories involves a cookie jar. At the home of one of my best friends there was a cookie jar that always – 100 percent of the time – was full of homemade chocolate chip cookies. Now, to be fair, that family, which included seven children, had a housekeeper whose job duties apparently included keeping that cookie jar full of chocolate chip cookies. She was very good at her job. Or at least the chocolate-chip-cookie-making part of her job. I can’t vouch for anything else.

That cookie jar full of chocolate chip cookies led me to promise myself that when I was grown up and had children, my cookie jar would always be full of chocolate chip cookies. Foolish childhood dreams.

I must admit that what my cookie jar is almost always filled with is Oreos. That’s because my husband, and ALL of my grandchildren, love Oreos. (As a side note, it’s interesting to see how each of them eats an Oreo. One eats it just like me – pulls it apart, eats the filling, then eats the cookies. Another eats it as a whole, in several bites. Two of them pull them apart, eat the filling, then attempt to simply throw away the cookie part. I say attempt, because that’s a no-go if I see them considering it. As for Bill, one bite and it’s gone!)

From my very limited survey, I have had to admit that more of my friends and family didn’t/don’t have a cookie jar than did/do. Thank goodness cookie jar manufacturers don’t’ have to rely on these folks for their living.

So I’m curious to know, did you grow up with a cookie jar? Do you have one now? Am I the only house with a cookie jar?