Home Plates: Reader says thank you by sharing cookie recipes

By way of thanks, Ann Begun sent recipes.

Recipes are, after all, the currency of Home Plates. While you needn't always return the favor when you receive a recipe you had wanted, it certainly is appreciated.

In Begun's case, she not only was reunited with the orange cake recipe she missed, you also offered her an essential piece of her childhood.

Flipping through a copy of the old Mixmaster booklet, provided by another reader, takes her back to the family kitchen in Santa Barbara. "We had a breakfast bar that overlooked the kitchen counter. You'd perch on a chair, and my mom would set up the Mixmaster right next to the bar. You could watch the ingredients spin around in the bowl," says says. "I remember going over the Mixmaster booklet as a kid and talking to my mom about possible combinations of icings and cakes. Would lemon be good with chocolate? What about spice and white?

"My mom and I always had fun talking about cooking and baking. Looking at the booklets you sent brought back some cherished memories."

Perhaps the two oatmeal cookie recipes Begun shares, in answer to a request from a reader named Geralynn, will mean as much in other households. Begun found a chewy oatmeal cookie recipe at www.quakeroats.com. I'm thinking chewy means really chewy in this case, since the recipe includes wheat bran.

She also shared her adaptation of the back-of-the-box Quaker

oatmeal cookie recipe. Cranberries and grated orange rind make the recipe appealingly different than the run-of-the-mill oatmeal-raisin cookie.

SECOND HELPINGS: Recent discussion about scrapple reminded Christine Cockey of the cookbook she put together of her grandmother's favorite recipes. While her grandmother grew up in the Central Valley, her family was Pennsylvania Dutch, Cockey says.

"They called scrapple 'ponhaus.' This was always made when you killed a pig," Cockey e-mailed. "You would always use the head and other parts that weren't much use for anything else when you killed a pig. Pigs' heads are more difficult to come by now, so I don't think anyone has made this recipe recently."

Forgive me if I am tempted to say "thank goodness" about the scarcity of pig heads. I fear I would have never made it in an earlier time. But I'm sure the end product is quite delicious. Accompanying the recipe in the cookbook is a note from Cockey's father, who says, "This stuff tasted like fancy sausage with a perfect texture. We considered this a treat."

Request line

• A comfort-craving friend asks for variations on the twice-baked potato theme, the more indulgent, the better.

• M. Barbao of Santa Clara can't see driving to Berkeley for salt-rising bread (available on Wednesdays at the Bread Garden Bakery), so she hopes a reader will share a recipe.