Crocus Cookies

These are your great-grandmother’s cookies. Five ingredients. No vanilla, no chocolate chips, no fancy business. Just lard, brown sugar, eggs, flour, and baking soda mixed together and dropped onto a sheet pan.

The lard is the whole point here. It gives these cookies a tender, flaky crumb and a richness that butter just can’t match. Brown sugar brings a molasses depth that keeps them from being one-note sweet.

The recipe makes 5 dozen, which is exactly the kind of yield you want when you’re baking for a crowd, a bake sale, or just stocking the cookie jar.

Kitchen Tips

• Use quality lard, not the shelf-stable stuff. Leaf lard from a butcher gives the cleanest flavor
• Beat those 8 eggs well before adding. They’re doing a lot of the leavening work alongside the baking soda
• Watch these closely in the oven. With no butter to brown predictably, they can go from golden to burnt fast
• Add a pinch of cinnamon or nutmeg to the dough if you want a little warmth without changing the character