Another recipe from the The Economical War-Time Cook Book, these cookies were designed to save on scarce ingredients such as wheat and fats during World War I. They also help use up leftovers, since they can be made with leftover mashed potatoes.

Although the United States never had official rationing during the first World War, the U.S. Food Administration still encouraged Americans not “to waste a single morsel of food that can be used” in order to prevent food shortages.

Potato Cookies (1/2 of original recipe):

• 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 cup hot mashed potatoes
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• about 2 cups barley flour
• about 1 cup rice flour
• sugar for sprinkling

1. Cream the shortening and sugar together, then mix in the beaten egg.
2. Add the salt, mashed potatoes, nutmeg, baking soda, and buttermilk, and mix well.
3. Mix in the barley flour and rice flour until the dough is thick enough to roll out.
4. Roll the dough out thin on a floured surface and cut into shapes.
5. Sprinkle the cookies with sugar and bake at 375 degrees for about 14-16 minutes, until the edges start to turn brown and the undersides are firm.

Tasting notes:

I never expect much from wartime recipes, but these cookies were better than I expected. The barley flour and potatoes together give the cookies a nutty, almost savory flavor underneath the sweetness of the sugar. Unfortunately, I disliked the texture of these cookies – on the first day they were baked, they were similar to sugar cookies, but over time they got softer and softer due to the mashed potatoes. After a few days they became far too soft and doughy for my taste. It’s possible that this could have been fixed by baking them longer so that they start out harder; the recipe doesn’t give you any baking times so I was really guessing at when to take them out of the oven.

I don’t think I’ll be adding these to my regular cookie rotation, but in times when wheat is scarce and potatoes are plentiful they would certainly be a decent substitute.

References:

Hill, J. M. (1918). Economical war-time cook book. New York: George Sully and Company. https://archive.org/details/economicalwartim00hill/page/54/mode/2up