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  • Cookie 

    A cookie (American English) or biscuit (British English) is a baked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat, and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, or nuts.

    Most English-speaking countries call crunchy cookies “biscuits“, except for the United States and Canada, where “biscuit” refers to a type of quick bread. Chewier biscuits are sometimes called “cookies,” even in the Commonwealth.[3] Some cookies may also be named by their shape, such as date squares or bars.

    Biscuit or cookie variants include sandwich biscuits, such as custard creams, Jammie Dodgers, Bourbons, and Oreos, with marshmallows or jam filling and sometimes dipped in chocolate or another sweet coating. Cookies are often served with beverages such as milk, coffee, or tea and sometimes dunked, an approach which releases more flavour from confections by dissolving the sugars,[4] while also softening their texture. Factory-made cookies are sold in grocery stores, convenience stores, and vending machines. Fresh-baked cookies are sold at bakeries and coffeehouses.

    Terminology

    Traditional American Christmas cookie tray

    In many English-speaking countries outside North America, including the United Kingdom, the most common word for a crisp cookie is “biscuit“.[3] Where biscuit is the most common term, “cookie” often only refers to one type of biscuit, a chocolate chip cookie.[5] However, in some regions both terms are used. The container used to store cookies may be called a cookie jar.

    In Scotland, the term “cookie” is sometimes used to describe a plain bun.[6]

    Cookies that are baked as a solid layer on a sheet pan and then cut, rather than being baked as individual pieces, are called bar cookies in American English or traybakes in British English.[3]

    Etymology

    The word cookie dates from at least 1701 in Scottish usage where the word meant “plain bun”, rather than thin baked good, and so it is not certain whether it is the same word. From 1808, the word “cookie” is attested “…in the sense of “small, flat, sweet cake” in American English. The American use is derived from Dutch koekje “little cake”, which is a diminutive of “koek” (“cake”), which came from the Middle Dutch word “koke“[7] with an informal, dialect variant koekie.[8] According to the Scottish National Dictionary, its Scottish name may derive from the diminutive form (+ suffix -ie) of the word cook, giving the Middle Scots cookie, cooky or cu(c)kie.[9] There was much trade and cultural contact across the North Sea between the Low Countries and Scotland during the Middle Ages, which can also be seen in the history of curling and, perhaps, golf.[citation needed]

    Description

    A dish of assorted cookies, including sandwich cookies filled with jam
    Cookies baking in an oven

    Cookies are most commonly baked until crisp or else for just long enough to ensure a soft interior. Other types of cookies are not baked at all, such as varieties of peanut butter cookies that use solidified chocolate rather than set eggs and wheat gluten as a binder.[10] Cookies are produced in a wide variety of styles, using an array of ingredients including sugars, spices, chocolate, butter, peanut butter, nuts, or dried fruits.

    A general theory of cookies may be formulated in the following way. Despite its descent from cakes and other sweetened breads, the cookie in almost all its forms has abandoned water as a medium for cohesion. Water in cakes serves to make the batter as thin as possible, the better to allow bubbles—responsible for a cake’s fluffiness—to form. In the cookie the agent of cohesion has become some form of oil. Oils, whether in the form of butter, vegetable oils, or lard, are much more viscous than water and evaporate freely at a far higher temperature. Thus a cake made with butter or eggs in place of water is much denser after removal from the oven.[citation needed]

    Rather than evaporating as water does in a baking cake, oils in cookies remain. These oils saturate the cavities created during baking by bubbles of escaping gases. These gases are primarily composed of steam vaporized from the egg whites and the carbon dioxide released by heating the baking powder. This saturation produces the most texturally attractive feature of the cookie, and indeed all fried foods: crispness saturated with a moisture (namely oil) that does not render soggy the food it has soaked into.[citation needed]

    History

    Thumbprint cookies

    Cookie-like hard wafers have existed for as long as baking has been documented, in part because they survive travel very well, but they were usually not sweet enough to be considered cookies by modern standards.[11]

    Cookies appear to have their origins in 7th century AD Persia, shortly after the use of sugar became relatively common in the region.[2][1] They spread to Europe through the Muslim conquest of Spain.[12][dubious – discuss] By the 14th century, they were common in all levels of society throughout Europe, from royal cuisine to street vendors.[12] The first documented instance of the figure-shaped gingerbread man was at the court of Elizabeth I of England in the 16th century. She had the gingerbread figures made and presented in the likeness of some of her important guests.[13]

    With global travel becoming widespread at that time, cookies made a natural travel companion, a modernized equivalent of the travel cakes used throughout history. One of the most popular early cookies, which traveled especially well and became known on every continent by similar names, was the jumble, a relatively hard cookie made largely from nuts, sweetener, and water.

    Cookies came to America through the Dutch in New Amsterdam in the late 1620s. The Dutch word “koekje” was Anglicized to “cookie” or cooky. The earliest reference to cookies in America is in 1703, when “The Dutch in New York provided…’in 1703…at a funeral 800 cookies…’”[14]

    The modern form of cookies, which is based on creaming butter and sugar together, did not appear commonly until the 18th century.[15] The Industrial Revolution in Britain and the consumers it created saw cookies (biscuits) become products for the masses, and firms such as Huntley & Palmers (formed in 1822), McVitie’s (formed in 1830) and Carr’s (formed in 1831) were all established.[16] The decorative biscuit tin, invented by Huntley & Palmers in 1831, saw British cookies exported around the world.[16] In 1891, Cadbury filed a patent for a chocolate-coated cookie.[16]

    The Bakarkhani cookie is part of Mughlai cuisine of the Indian subcontinent.

    Classification

    Cookie dough ready to be put in the oven

    Cookies are broadly classified according to how they are formed or made, including at least these categories:

    • Bar cookies consist of batter or other ingredients that are poured or pressed into a pan (sometimes in multiple layers) and cut into cookie-sized pieces after baking. In British English, bar cookies are known as “tray bakes”.[3] Examples include brownies, fruit squares, and bars such as date squares.
    • Drop cookies are made from a relatively soft dough that is dropped by spoonfuls onto the baking sheet. During baking, the mounds of dough spread and flatten. Chocolate chip cookies (Toll House cookies), oatmeal raisin (or other oatmeal-based) cookies, and rock cakes are popular examples of drop cookies. This may also include thumbprint cookies, for which a small central depression is created with a thumb or small spoon before baking to contain a filling, such as jam or a chocolate chip.[17] In the UK, the term “cookie” often refers only to this particular type of product.
    • Filled cookies are made from a rolled cookie dough filled with a fruit, jam or confectionery filling before baking. Hamantashen are a filled cookie.
    • Molded cookies are also made from a stiffer dough that is molded into balls or cookie shapes by hand before baking. Snickerdoodles and peanut butter cookies are examples of molded cookies. Some cookies, such as hermits or biscotti, are molded into large flattened loaves that are later cut into smaller cookies.
    • No-bake cookies are made by mixing a filler, such as cereal or nuts, into a melted confectionery binder, shaping into cookies or bars, and allowing to cool or harden. Oatmeal clusters and rum balls are no-bake cookies.
    • Pressed cookies are made from a soft dough that is extruded from a cookie press into various decorative shapes before baking. Spritzgebäck is an example of a pressed cookie.
    • Refrigerator cookies (also known as icebox cookies) are made from a stiff dough that is refrigerated to make the raw dough even stiffer before cutting and baking. The dough is typically shaped into cylinders which are sliced into round cookies before baking. Pinwheel cookies and those made by Pillsbury are representative.
    • Rolled cookies are made from a stiffer dough that is rolled out and cut into shapes with a cookie cutter. Gingerbread men are an example.
    • Sandwich cookies are rolled or pressed cookies that are assembled as a sandwich with a sweet filling. Fillings include marshmallow, jam, and icing. The Oreo cookie, made of two chocolate cookies with a vanilla icing filling, is an example.
    A pack of Finnish Domino cookies

    Other types of cookies are classified for other reasons, such as their ingredients, size, or intended time of serving:

    • Breakfast cookies are typically larger, lower-sugar cookies filled with “heart-healthy nuts and fiber-rich oats” that are eaten as a quick breakfast snack.[18]
    • Low-fat cookies or diet cookies typically have lower fat than regular cookies.[19]
    • Raw cookie dough is served in some restaurants, though the eggs may be omitted since the dough is eaten raw, which could pose a salmonella risk if eggs were used. Cookie Dough Confections in New York City is a restaurant that has a range of raw cookie dough flavors, which are scooped into cups for customers like ice cream.[20]
    • Skillet cookies are big cookies that are cooked in a cast-iron skillet and served warm, while they are still soft and chewy. They are either eaten straight from the pan or cut into wedges, often with vanilla ice cream on top.[21]
    • Supersized cookies are large cookies such as the Panera Kitchen Sink Cookie.[22] These very large cookies are sold at grocery stores, restaurants and coffeeshops.
    • Vegan cookies can be made with flour, sugar, nondairy milk, and nondairy margarine. Aquafaba icing can be used to decorate the cookies.
    • Cookie cakes are made in a larger circular shape usually with writing made of frosting.

    Reception

    Leah Ettman from Nutrition Action has criticized the high-calorie count and fat content of supersized cookies, which are extra large cookies; she cites the Panera Kitchen Sink Cookie, a supersized chocolate chip cookie, which measures 5+1⁄2 inches in diameter and has 800 calories.[22] For busy people who eat breakfast cookies in the morning, Kate Bratskeir from the Huffington Post recommends lower-sugar cookies filled with “heart-healthy nuts and fiber-rich oats”.[18] A book on nutrition by Paul Insel et al. notes that “low-fat” or “diet cookies” may have the same number of calories as regular cookies, due to added sugar.[19]

    There are a number of slang usages of the term “cookie”. The slang use of “cookie” to mean a person, “especially an attractive woman” is attested to in print since 1920.[7] The catchphrase “that’s the way the cookie crumbles”, which means “that’s just the way things happen” is attested to in print in 1955.[7] Other slang terms include “smart cookie” and “tough cookie.” According to The Cambridge International Dictionary of Idioms, a smart cookie is “someone who is clever and good at dealing with difficult situations.”[23] The word “cookie” has been vulgar slang for “vagina” in the US since 1970.[24] The word “cookies” is used to refer to the contents of the stomach, often in reference to vomiting (e.g., “pop your cookies”, a 1960s expression, or “toss your cookies”, a 1970s expression).[24] The expression “cookie cutter”, in addition to referring literally to a culinary device used to cut rolled cookie dough into shapes, is also used metaphorically to refer to items or things “having the same configuration or look as many others” (e.g., a “cookie cutter tract house“) or to label something as “stereotyped or formulaic” (e.g., an action movie filled with “generic cookie cutter characters”).[25] “Cookie duster” is a whimsical expression for a mustache.

    Cookie Monster is a Muppet on the children’s television show Sesame Street. He is best known for his voracious appetite for cookies and his famous eating phrases, such as “Me want cookie!”, “Me eat cookie!” (or simply “COOKIE!”), and “Om nom nom nom” (said through a mouth full of food).[26][27][28][29]

    Cookie Clicker is a game where players click a cookie to buy upgrades to make more cookies.

    Notable varieties

    See also: List of cookies

    • A variety of Maple spice cookies and thumbprint cookies
    • A cookie cake is a large cookie that can be decorated with icing or fondant like a cake. This is made by Mrs. Fields.
    • Hearts shaped Valentine’s Day cookies adorned with icing
    • A McVitie’s chocolate digestive, a popular biscuit to dunk in tea/coffee in the UK
    • A fortune cookie
    • Meringue cookies
    • Commercially sold Oreo cookies
    • Choc-chip cookies
    • A cookie shop, filled with a wide range of cookies
    • Cookie cutters
    • A cookie dessert, topped with ice cream
    • A plate of chocolate chip cookies
    • Algerian cookies
    • Little heart-shaped cookies from India

    Manufacturers

    Product lines and brands

    Miscellaneous

  • Coat 

    A coat is typically an outer garment for the upper body, worn by any gender for warmth or fashion.[1] Coats typically have long sleeves and are open down the front, and closing by means of buttons, zippers, hook-and-loop fasteners (AKA velcro), toggles, a belt, or a combination of some of these. Other possible features include collars, shoulder straps, and hoods.

    Etymology

    [edit]

    Coat is one of the earliest clothing category words in English, attested as far back as the early Middle Ages. (See also Clothing terminology.) The Oxford English Dictionary traces coat in its modern meaning to c. 1300, when it was written cote or cotte. The word coat stems from Old French and then Latin cottus.[2] It originates from the Proto-Indo-European word for woolen clothes.

    Watercolor painting of a dark-bearded white man in glasses, a hat, and a long, thick, pale-colored coat with a fur collar. The man has his hands in his pockets, and the coat is open, showing indiscriminate clothing of a dark color beneath.
    Man wearing a coat, painting by Julian Fałat, 1900

    An early use of coat in English is coat of mail (chainmail), a tunic-like garment of metal rings, usually knee- or mid-calf length.[3]

    History

    [edit]

    The origins of the Western-style coat may be traced to the sleeved, close-fitted and front-fastened coats worn by the scythian nomads of the eurasian steppes, though this style of coat may be much older, having been found with four-thousand-year-old Tarim mummies and in five-thousand-year-old mummy of Otzi[4][5][6][7][8] The medieval and renaissance coat (generally spelled cote or cotte by costume historians) is a mid-length, sleeved outer garment worn by both men and women, fitted to the waist and buttoned up the front, with a full skirt in its essentials, not unlike the modern coat.[9]

    By the eighteenth century, overcoats had begun to supplant capes and cloaks as outerwear in Western fashion. Before the Industrial Revolution, which began in the second half of the eighteenth century, the extremely high cost of cloth meant certain styles of clothing represented wealth and rank, but as cloth became more affordable post-industrialization, people within a lower social class could adopt the fashionable outdoor wear of the wealthy elite, which, notably, included a coat.[10] In the nineteenth century, the invention of the sewing machine paired with existing textile machinery increased the affordability of mass-produced, ready-to-wear clothing and helped spur the popularity of wearing coats and jackets.[11] By the mid-twentieth century the terms jacket and coat became confused for recent styles; the difference in use is still maintained for older garments.

    Coats, jackets and overcoats

    [edit]

    Black-and-white fashion plate of two Victorian-era white men each wearing top hats, coats, trousers and black shoes. The man on the left is wearing an open, thick overcoat that reaches to his calves, with loose sleeves that reach his wrists and wide cuffs on the sleeves. The lapel is also broad, covering his shoulders. He is wearing a coat beneath this that reaches his knees that fastens off-center. Beneath that, a pair of checked trousers is visible on the lower-half and upper-half a vest is visible over a white shirt with a tall collar and small bowtie. The man on the right is wearing a buttoned topcoat that reaches his knees where it flares out. His sleeves reach his wrists and the coat is buttoned off-center with two rows of buttons. Beneath this are a pair of dark trousers and a barely visible neckline of a white shirt.
    Overcoat (left) and topcoat (right) from The Gazette of Fashion, 1872

    In the early nineteenth century, Western-style coats were divided into under-coats and overcoats. The term “under-coat” is now archaic but denoted the fact that the word coat could be both the outermost layer for outdoor wear (overcoat) or the coat is worn under that (under-coat). However, the term coat has begun to denote just the overcoat rather than the under-coat. The older usage of the word coat can still be found in the expression “to wear a coat and tie”,[12] which does not mean that wearer has on an overcoat. Nor do the terms tailcoat, morning coat or house coat denote types of overcoat. Indeed, an overcoat may be worn over the top of a tailcoat. In tailoring circles, the tailor who makes all types of coats is called a coat maker. Similarly, in American English, the term sports coat is used to denote a type of jacket not worn as outerwear (overcoat) (sports jacket in British English).

    Swedish police women with coats in 1958. That was their uniform.

    The term jacket is a traditional term usually used to refer to a specific type of short under-coat.[13] Typical modern jackets extend only to the upper thigh in length, whereas older coats such as tailcoats are usually of knee length. The modern jacket worn with a suit is traditionally called a lounge coat (or a lounge jacket) in British English and a sack coat in American English. The American English term is rarely used. Traditionally, the majority of men dressed in a coat and tie, although this has become gradually less widespread since the 1960s. Because the basic pattern for the stroller (black jacket worn with striped trousers in British English) and dinner jacket (tuxedo in American English) are the same as lounge coats, tailors traditionally call both of these special types of jackets a coat.

    An overcoat is designed to be worn as the outermost garment worn as outdoor wear;[14] while this use is still maintained in some places, particularly in Britain, elsewhere the term coat is commonly used mainly to denote only the overcoat, and not the under-coat. A topcoat is a slightly shorter[citation needed] overcoat, if any distinction is to be made. Overcoats worn over the top of knee length coats (under-coats) such as frock coats, dress coats, and morning coats are cut to be a little longer than the under-coat so as to completely cover it, as well as being large enough to accommodate the coat underneath.

    The length of an overcoat varies: mid-calf being the most frequently found and the default when current fashion is not concerned with hemlines. Designs vary from knee-length to ankle-length, briefly fashionable in the early 1970s and known (to contrast with the usurped mini) as the “maxi”.[15]

    Speakers of American English sometimes informally use the words jacket and coat interchangeably.[16]

    Types

    [edit]

    Eighteenth and nineteenth centuries

    [edit]

    Men’s

    [edit]

    Some of these styles are still worn. Note that for this period, only coats of the under-coat variety are listed, and overcoats are excluded.

    Women’s

    [edit]

    • Caraco, an eighteenth- and nineteenth-century fitted coat initially associated with the working class; it is similar to a Bedgown
    • Casaquin, an eighteenth-century coat that fastened down the middle and reached the hip
    • Redingote, an eighteenth-century fitted riding coat with a long skirt down the back worn as a part of a riding habit
    • Spencer, a waist-length, frequently double-breasted, coat from the early nineteenth century sometimes made of the same cloth as the gown beneath it
    • Pelisse, an early-nineteenth-century high-waisted and fitted long coat
    • Basque bodice, a Victorian-era coat that was sometimes made with tails
    • Paletot, a nineteenth-century mid- to full-length coat similar in design to the casaquin in which it is fastens in the front and is fitted to the waist before widening to drape over the skirt
    • Suit coats, a development in the late nineteenth century in which coats or jackets paired with a skirt of the same cloth were worn for purposes other than as riding habits; developed into women’s modern suit sets
    Color photograph of a burgundy-colored, very loose fitting coat that opens down the middle, reaches the wearer's knees and has short loose-sleeves that stop before the elbow. There is a rough appearance to the texture of the cloth.
    An evening coat from the 1950s by designer Sybil Connolly

    Modern

    [edit]

    Further information on modern coats: Jacket

    The terms coat and jacket are both used around the world. The modern terms “jacket” and “coat” are often used interchangeably as terms, although the term “coat” tends to be used to refer to longer garments.

    Modern coats include the: