Vintage Peanut Butter Cookies

For more on bacon, please read my friend Portia's article all about this godly ingredient:


I know, I know...more bacon... it's everywhere...I feel like half the recipes I look at use bacon. It's just cool right now. Fortunately these cookies give you a way to use up all the bacon fat you get in the process of making anything else with bacon in it, a way to use the whole animal while saving a couple bucks.

I call these vintage because back in the depression and during the war when butter was as gold is today, bacon fat could have been a cheap alternative to butter and a better tasting alternative to shortening. Also, Vintage Peanut Butter Cookies sounds better than Bacon Grease Cookies. I based the recipe off one my grandmother used to make in the 1950s, but replaced the shortening with bacon fat and added a couple pinches of this and that.



Vintage Peanut Butter Cookies
makes 30-36

125 g bacon fat (1/2 cup)
100 g sugar (1/2 cup)
30 g molasses (2 tbsp)
225 g peanut butter (1 cup)
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1 tsp white vinegar
190 g flour (1 1/2 cups)
15 g cornstarch (2 tbsp)
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
tiny pinch cinnamon (optional)

1 Preheat the oven to 350 F
2 Cream the bacon fat, sugar and molasses until smooth, then add the peanut butter until combined
3 Add the vanilla, egg and vinegar to the bacon fat and peanut butter mixture and stir until uniform
4 Sift together the dry ingredients and add to the wet in 3 additions and mix just until smooth
5 Form into hefty tablespoon sized balls, press down with a fork and bake 10-12 or until the edges are just golden

These cookies are easy peasy and cheap as heck if you get the peanut butter on sale! If you don't tell people you used bacon fat, they probably won't notice enough to comment. If you do tell them, they might be able to identify a slight smokey flavour. I find even timid eaters will eat these cookies without complaint.

Enjoy and remember: never throw out your bacon fat, it is a cheap and flavourful addition to many recipes!