2 February, 2022
Arrowroot Cookies
This recipe is both a tasty treat for snackers of all ages and a tummy soother. As I mentioned last week, I’ve been going through some disordered eating issues, and one of the most common complications I face is nausea. Like. Constant nausea. I’m no stranger to upset stomachs, but over the years, sucking on a ginger chew has done less and less for me (and, frankly, after the better part of a couple of decades, I’m kind of sick of ginger in a medicinal context). I don’t want to throw a regular anti-nausea med onto the schedule because it’s not usually so bad that I feel like I’m going to toss cookies (though, when it has gotten that bad, thank god for prescription anti-emetics, holy cow). So, facing down queasiness after every meal (and sometimes before because my stomach just hates life), I started looking for a different solution to quell the quease.
A friend of mine, who’s also struggled with stomach squelching suggested I look for arrowroot cookies in the grocery store. According to him, they worked better than anything else he’d tried. I figured it was worth a shot, so I went looking. I did eventually find arrowroot cookies in the baby aisle — several weeks after I made this recipe, naturally. They were tiny and expensive, so the fact that I’d resorted to the DIY method actually worked out pretty well in my favor. Finding arrowroot flour for this recipe meant a trip to the fancy grocery store that carries 8,000 varieties of specialty flour for gluten allergies and nut allergies and people who want to try jello enemas… idk. The point is that there was a variety and arrowroot flour was among what was available. The brand was Bob’s Red Mill. Their stuff is pretty ubiquitous, so if you can’t find them locally, I guarantee you can find a bag of their arrowroot flour online.
The rest of the ingredients were your basic baking goods. Making the cookies is like making sugar cookies or any other cutter cookie (and, if you ask me, these are way easier than sugar cookies, though I’m beginning to think cookie-cutter sugar cookies are just another form of baking kryptonite for me, much like apple pies; must be something about classics that I just can’t make work). This recipe makes a reasonable amount of cookies. Doubling the batch to stock up makes a veritable ton of these little suckers. They freeze like champs though, so if you go the route that I did and make a bunch at once, just bag ’em and stuff them in the freezer. They’ll keep for months.
Ingredients
1/4 cup Butter, room temperature
1/2 cup Sugar
1 Egg
1/2 tsp Vanilla
1 cup All-purpose flour
1/2 cup Arrowroot flour
1/2 tsp Baking soda
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Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and line two baking sheets.
Cream together butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer until just smooth before adding in the egg and vanilla. In a separate bowl, mix (don’t sift — the arrowroot flour will get everywhere) your dry ingredients together before gradually adding them into the wet mixture.
Divide the dough in half and roll it out until it’s roughly 1/8″ thick and cut into small rounds (I used a 1″ cutter). Transfer the cut cookies to a baking sheet and prick the centers with a toothpick or a fork. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until the edges just begin to turn golden brown. Let cool for a couple of minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Store in an airtight container on the counter for up to a month (all they really do is get a bit hard, which, for biscuits, doesn’t make that much of a difference, in my opinion) or store in the freezer for several.
