yum yum -- peanut butter

peanut butter cookie stack, originally uploaded by shaunaforce.

Look at those cookies. Aren't they gorgeous? Can you believe they are gluten-free?

So many people settle for lousy food with no real taste, because they believe that is all they will find when they have to eat gluten-free. I'm here to tell you -- silly. These peanut butter cookies are some of the best I have ever eaten. In fact, I cannot have them around the house too much, or else I will nibble on one after the other while I am typing away. However, for special days....

I made up this recipe, about a month ago, after catching the last half of a sentence of a woman on the street. As I walked past her on the sidewalk in Madison Park, I heard her say, "...don't need flour to make peanut butter cookies..." She walked into a store with her friend, and I didn't hear the rest.

It doesn't take much more than that for my mind to start racing.

In the middle of the afternoon, when the sentences stopped singing and my mind felt clogged, I walked into the kitchen and pulled out a jar of peanut butter from the refrigerator. The Chef was at his restaurant. No one else was in the house. If this small experimental batch turned out to be a disaster, who would know?

They were anything but a disaster.

The next night, Molly and Brandon came over for dinner. In fact, it was the night we ate pork chops with plum sauce. I had a few peanut butter cookies left over, sitting on the metal kitchen shelves. Want to try one, I asked?

Last week, Molly emailed me and asked, "Hey, can I get your flourless peanut butter cookie recipe one of these days? I keep craving them..."

Of course, my dear. Here you are.

However, if you want a real treat, you should eat dessert at the Chef's restaurant. He loves these peanut butter cookies so much that he started making them himself. He serves a little stack of them with chocolate mousse and a bittersweet chocolate sauce, as a parfait in a martini glass. Now that is decadence.

Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies

One cup creamy peanut butter
One cup white sugar
One teaspoon baking powder
One egg

Preheat the oven to 350°.

Cream the peanut butter and sugar in a bowl. (As much as I love my KitchenAid, I have found that this is a hand-stirring job). Beat in the baking powder. Add the egg. Mix until it is all well combined.

The dough will be sticky, so be prepared to get your hands messy. Roll some dough into a ball. (How big? That depends on you. I have found, however, that the smaller these cookies are, the better they hold together. Eat two instead of one!) Roll the ball into white sugar. Line a baking sheet, covered in parchment paper, with sugary balls of dough.

Bake in the oven for about ten minutes. You will know the cookies are done when they feel coherent, but still a little soft. Take the tray out of the oven and let the cookies rest for at least five minutes. Afterwards, carefully transfer them to a cooling rack. After ten minutes or so, they will have hardened and be glistening with sugar.

Eat them.

Makes ten to twelve cookies.