Cookie

Active time: 35 min Start to finish: 5 hr (includes chilling)

Active time: 35 min Start to finish: 5 hr (includes chilling)

In nineteenth-century America, kichlers or Haman's Ears for Purim Night were small cookies (kichel is cookie in Yiddish), sometimes made from a pound-cake batter, deep-fried in butter, and bathed in sugar syrup flavored with cinnamon and rose water. Notice that butter was used in this age before vegetable shortening. Haman's Ears is also the American name for a kichel, kichelkies, or hazenblosen (blown-up little pants), thin strips of fried dough sprinkled with confectioners' sugar, similar to the Italian bugie served at Carnivale in February. "When I would ask my grandmother how much red wine to use in her kichelkies, she would reply, 'Half and egg shell,'" said Flora Atkin, who enjoys making traditional family recipes for holidays. "She used to say, 'I know my recipe won't die because my granddaughter will carry on the tradition.'" She was right. Before Rosh Hashanah, each year, Mrs. Atkin makes kichelkies on an assembly line with three frying pans going at once.

When we were taking our baby steps as chefs, one of our favorite teachers was Lydia, queen of the soup pots at the Strathallen Hotel in Rochester, New York. She grew up in Austria, so, of course, she knew plenty about baking. When we got to work in the morning, we'd taste that day's "zoop" (as she'd say in her strong accent), then watch as she demonstrated family baking recipes like this one. Grating the frozen shortbread dough into the baking pan gives it a lighter, more open texture; adding a middle layer of raspberry jam makes it stunningly delicious. For a chocolate-raspberry shortbread, substitute 1 cup cocoa for 1 cup of the flour.

Inspired by the poppy seed breads made in many Russian homes, these cookies capture the traditional flavors without the time investment of making a yeast bread. You can substitute 1 cup walnuts (toasted, cooled, and finely chopped) for the poppy seeds if you prefer.

Here's a real treat for the lunch box. Adding dried cherries and chocolate chips turns classic oatmeal cookies into something new.

To roll out this dough you will need a pastry cloth and a rolling-pin cover, which are available at kitchenware stores and by mail order from Bridge Kitchenware, tel. (800) 274-3435 or (212) 838-1901.

These cookies are a delicious variation on the traditional and are reminiscent of rugelach.

The lusciously sticky caramel-pecan top layer in this brownie was inspired by the chewy chocolate candies called "turtles."

Our food editors dreamed up this variation on a classic theme for our "all-French" issue, published to coincide with the French republic's Bicentennial celebrations.

(ZALETTINI) These shortbread-like cookies get their crunchy texture and pretty yellow color from cornmeal. They are enjoyed all over Veneto, a region known for its polenta. In fact, zalettini means "little yellow ones" in the Venetian dialect.

Senior editor Karen Kaplan devised these delicious lemon sugar cookies. They're cut into Hanukkah shapes-menorahs, dreidels and Hebrew letters-and decorated with blue and white icing. Wrap them in tins, decorated shoe boxes, hatboxes or pretty bags. They make nice hostess gifts for couples with young children.

"When I lived in South Africa, rum and raisin chocolate bars were a special treat," says Beth Peterson of Phoenix, Arizona. "I created this brownie recipe based on that combination of flavors, and perfected it with the help of friends and colleagues who sampled the brownies at each stage of development. These have a grown-up taste with the right balance of sweetness and rum." Try these warm with vanilla ice cream.