National Peanut Butter Cookie Day

The internet will tell you just about anything you need to know. And a whole lot you don’t need. Today is one of those days when I can share some fun but rather useless information: Today is National Peanut Butter Cookie Day. Not to be confused with National Peanut Butter Day, which is, as everyone knows, January 24. Nope today is the day we are supposed to celebrate the cookie with the criss cross on top. Ya gotta love that. And since it was the internet that pointed out this silliness to me I went digging around a little and found some fun peanut facts for you:

• It takes about 540 peanuts to make a 12-ounce jar of peanut butter.
• Astronaut Allen B. Sheppard brought a peanut with him to the moon.
• Americans were first introduced to the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup in 1928.
• The average American consumes more than six pounds of peanuts and peanut butter products each year.
• Sixty percent of consumers prefer creamy peanut butter over crunchy.
• The peanut is not a nut, but a legume related to beans and lentils.

How will I be celebrating? Well I’m making a batch of peanut butter cookies of course. And the thing I like best about peanut butter cookies, aside from eating the dough, is pressing the fork into the top to give them their signature look. It’s the international symbol for peanut butter cookies you know. What other cookie gets that criss cross anyway? None.Here’s my favorite peanut butter cookie recipe so you can celebrate today too.½ cup sugar½ cup packed brown sugar½ cup peanut butter¼ cup shortening¼ butter1 egg1 ¼ cup flour¾ tsp baking soda½ tsp baking powder¼ tsp saltHeat the oven to 375°Mix all the ingredients well.Shape into ballsPlace on cookie sheetFlatten cookies with a fork criss crossBake for 10 minutesAnd if you really feel like celebrating put a scoop of vanilla ice cream between two warm cookies. Oh my it’s a happy thing.I’m sending a batch of these cookies to my son. Zach is off for this summer doing an internship at BU School of Pharmacology. I spent his freshman year making sure he had care packages. Summer is no reason to stop. It is, after all, National Peanut Butter Cookie Day, he gets to celebrate too.I wonder what the next cookie holiday is? I’ll bet the internet knows…