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If you think about it, why would you make a mess all over the clean kitchen to bake only a dozen cookies.. Heck, on a bad day, I could scarf down 12 delicious homemade cookies with my first cup of coffee..

Sooooo, in my old fashioned Italian home, when Thanksgiving or Christmas came around, we would destroy the house making a dozen different kinds of cookie recipes and over a zillion cookies, until we were absolutely sure that the entire neighborhood and every distant relative had enough cookies to ensure a diabetic seizure..

Italian Date-Fig Whiskey Spice Cookies

Step One – Filling:
1 lb. Figs, pitted
1 lb. Dates, pitted
1 lb. Raisins
1 lb. Walnuts
1/2 jar strawberry jam
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup whiskey (the cheap stuff that you keep in the pantry)
1 orange rind, grated small
1/2 cup warm water, or till moist
Pinch pepper
Pinch allspice
Pinch cinnamon

Grind all Filling ingredients together and let set overnight in refrigerator.

Step Two – Cookie dough:
8 cups sifted flour
1 cup sugar
3 tbs. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1-1/2 cups shortening
3 eggs
About 1 cup milk
1-1/2 tsp. vanilla
1-1/2 tsp. anise flavoring

Double this recipe; only make 1/2 at a time. Ingredients for half are listed.
Sift flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Cut in shortening with fingers until mixture resembles corn meal. Make a well in flour and put eggs into it. Add half of the milk and both flavorings. Knead well for 5 minutes, adding the balance of milk gradually as you knead. Add only enough milk to make medium-soft dough, which is easy to handle.

Roll it out on a lightly floured cutting board. Fill the dough with the filling in a long strip, only using about the size of a large crayon's worth of filling. Roll the dough over the filling and cut the dough so there is dough all around the filling. You will then cut the cookies in about 1-1/2 inch pieces, cutting at an angle. Place on cookie sheet and bake cookies at 375 degrees for 20 minutes.

Step 3 – Frosting:
3 cups powdered sugar
3 tbs. melted butter
¼ cup lukewarm water
1 tbs. vanilla

Whip frosting until of spreading consistency. After cookies have cooled complete, spread them with frosting and decorate with colored sprinkles if desired.

If you double this recipe, it will make about 400 to 500 cookies.