Poppy Seed Cookies

 I supppose this will be my last post before Passover begins tonight! I can hardly believe it's here already, but the holiday is not the subject of this post; these Poppy Seed Cookies are. After making the Orange Poppy Seed Cake for Purim, I had leftover poppy seeds sitting in my fridge. I headed back to Marcy Goldman's Treasury of Jewish Holiday Baking and decided to make this recipe. It seemed basic enough and I had all of the ingredients on hand. All it takes is one bowl and a whisk to whip this up plus a bit of chill time. I found these cookies to be addictive and delicious, crunchy and snappy, redolent of the best sugar cookies- the perfect accompaniment to tea or coffee. I love the look of the poppy seeds in the cookie but their flavor isn't so prominent in the finished product, which my friends actually appreciated; I guess the younger crowd isn't that fond of poppy seeds... I started shaping these cookies with a fluted cutter as Marcy shows in the book, but I decided that wasn't the best option for this soft dough, as the shape got ruined in the transfer. No matter how you cut 'em, though, these simple and unassuming cookies really are worthy of being made. Happy holidays!

Poppy Seed Cookies
from Treasury of Jewish Holiday Baking

3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 1/3 cups sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
about 3 1/4 cups flour
2 1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup poppy seeds

Preheat your oven to 350 and line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone.
In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the oil and sugar. Whisk in the eggs one at a time and then the vanilla, beating well to combine. Fold in all of the dry ingredients. Cover the dough and let rest for about fifteen minutes. Working with a third at a time, roll the dough out onto a well floured surface, about 1/8 inch thick. (I chilled the remaining dough in the meantime.) Cut the dough into 2 inch rounds and place cookies in baking sheets. Bake until lightly golden about 12-15 minutes. Repeat with remaining dough.
Store in a zip-top bag.