This recipe is next in the “Baking without…Sugar” series. It’s difficult to make sweet desserts and treats without sugar, but home front housewives did their best using the resources they had at hand. These spicy raisin cookies are from a December 1944 Woman’s Day Kitchen recipe. The recipe would have cost 27 cents and it was published in the January 1945 issue of Woman’s Day.
Spicy Raisin Cookies
2 1/2 c. sifted cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp ginger
3/4 c. raisins
1 egg, well beaten
3/4 c. molasses
3/4 c. sausage fat
Mix and sift dry ingredients. Add raisins. Add combined egg, molasses, and cooled melted fat all at once. Mix this well. Drop onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 375° for about 15 minutes.
Results
First, a couple of notes. The recipe called for a grade B egg. Grade B eggs are not available where I live. I substituted Crisco for the sausage fat. I also adjusted the cooking time. Fifteen minutes in my oven resulted in cookies with burned bottoms. Ten minutes worked much better.
The cookies were a little on the dry side. They were not overly sweet. The raisins added a nice chewy texture. I think these would be nice with some chopped nuts added into the batter, and maybe a few more raisins. There’s definitely a molasses taste to them, so if raisins or molasses aren’t your favorites, I’d skip these. I had the same 9 testers as before, and everyone said that these were not their favorites, but they weren’t terrible, either. I think that if I was a home front housewife on the last of my sugar for the month, these would make a decent dessert to hold my family over until we were able to get more sugar to bake with. If I wanted something sweeter, but without sugar, I would go with the Rolled Maple Lace Wafers instead.
History in the Kitchen 