Zoe Francois built her baking reputation working as a pastry chef for Andrew Zimmern. But she traces her “cookie DNA,” as she calls it, to her ancestors.
That family history, and her own baking evolution, provides the framework for the craveable recipes within “Zoe Bakes Cookies: Everything You Need to Know to Make Your Favorite Cookies and Bars” (Ten Speed Press, $30).
“Cookies started my wonderfully wild voyage into baking,” writes Francois, a social media star, Magnolia Network TV host, and prolific author whose 2021 cookbook, “Zoe Bakes Cakes,” won an award from the International Association of Culinary Professionals.
Her latest cookbook opens with a recollection of her 5-year-old self devouring buttery rugelach and jam-filled hamantaschen from a tiny Jewish bakery in Brooklyn with her mom, Bubbe (her maternal grandmother), and aunts. She recounts, just as vividly, how her other grandmother, Granny Neal in New Jersey, “pulled out all the stops for Christmas” with spritz cookies and layered coconut bars, “plus a few Norwegian family recipes tossed in.”
Those memories, Francois writes, stand out because of their contrast to cookies that passed for treats in the Vermont commune where she grew up, which resembled “something closer to tree bark than sweetness and joy.” In the first chapter, she elevates their “wholesome and earnest” intentions with tributes in the form of Coconut Oatmeal Raisin Cookies, Aunt Melissa’s Granola and Zucchini Cake-Brownies.
Subsequent chapters follow her life’s timeline, with recipes inspired by both grandmothers, worldly discoveries such as Lacy Oat Crisps (Florentines) learned in middle school; the chocolate chip experiments that made her college cookie cart business a success; and snickerdoodles and other state fair winners emblematic of her adopted Minnesota home.
If you think your old reliable recipe for chocolate chip cookies can’t be beat, I urge you to try Francois’s current favorite version as I did and prepare to be wowed. She describes them as “perfect,” yet she’s not done tweaking, and encourages us to do the same.
“It’s the perfect example of how fluid baking can be, which is exactly what makes it so fun and exciting!”
Susan Puckett is a cookbook author and former food editor of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Follow her at susanpuckett.com.
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