Rich recipes

Young Chang

Newport Beach

This is where the memory of Pam Bartolone and the culinary flair of

Judy Wheeler meld:

You cool Pam’s Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies.

You scoop some vanilla bean or chocolate ice cream (Wheeler’s touch)

on one cookie, top the combo with another cookie and trim the edges.

Freeze this for two hours.

Melt a favorite chocolate. Roll the edges of the sandwich in it, then

roll the chocolate-covered rim in chopped nuts.

The result? A winner at the Orange County Fair’s Blue Bonnet Margarine

Cookie Contest and a tribute to the late Bartolone, who died 20 years ago

in a car accident.

She loved to cook, she loved to bake cookies and she loved to eat all

the cookies, Wheeler said.

“We were close,” the Costa Mesa resident said. “And I have the recipes

that she had written down in her recipe book.”

Laden with as much rich history as with the contest’s signature Blue

Bonnet Margarine, this year’s three winning cookie recipes at the Orange

County Fair have stories to tell.

Barbara Belohovek, who won third place for her “Snow Balls,” shares a

tale about 30 years old.

She was a young bride -- a mom by age 20 -- and wanting to start her

family’s own holiday traditions. Belohovek, now 50, pored through recipes

in magazines looking for ones that might impress the father-in-law and

the rest of the family. She found “Snow Balls” in an issue of Christmas

Helps from Family Circle.

“And people ask for ‘em every year,” Belohovek said. “The magazine is

falling apart now. It’s pretty fragile.”

Scribbled with calculations from when the Huntington Beach resident

tried to make multiple times the recommended serving, the recipe is not

for the calorie-conscious.

They’re margarine and butter based cookies rolled up into balls, baked

and rolled in powdered sugar.

“They look like snow balls and they’re really flaky, really buttery,”

she said. “It just seems to be a cookie that everybody’s attracted to and

loves.”

Mary Miller, a Ladera Ranch resident and the second place winner of

the contest, baked Viennesean Sandwich Cookies with lemon icing. They’re

dipped halfway in chocolate and rolled partway in nuts.

She got the recipe from a cooking class she took about 10 years ago,

but the family tradition of baking cookies around the holidays started

with her grandmother Hildreth Hume.

Miller, Hume and Miller’s mother Yvonne would stand around Yvonne

Miller’s Balboa Island kitchen where the cupboards are painted with

family stories.

They’d make 40 kinds of cookies -- including sugar, ginger, Chinese

puzzles, brownies, spice, nutmeg, Russian tea cakes, pecan tortes and, of

course, the Viennesean treats.

Today, it’s just Yvonne and Mary Miller who bake, but they assume

every year that Hume would’ve been proud.

“We have two ovens going at all times, and it’s quite a production,”

Miller said.

FIRST PLACE: Pam’s Ice Cream Sandwich

Yields 16 sandwiches

1 and 1/3 cups Blue Bonnet margarine

1 cup white sugar

1 cup brown sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 eggs

3 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup chocolate chips

1 cup chopped nuts

Cream margarine, sugar, vanilla and eggs. Stir in flour, baking soda

and salt. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts. Use a small ice cream scooper

to scoop out cookie dough. Bake at 375 degrees for 10 to 15 minutes. Cool on rack.

Scoop your favorite ice cream onto one cooled cookie, place another

cookie on top and trim the ice cream around edges of cookie. Freeze for

two hours.

Melt your favorite chocolate. Roll the edges of the cookie in the

melted chocolate and sprinkle with more chopped nuts.

SECOND PLACE: Viennesean Sandwich Cookies

Yields 24 cookies

1 cup margarine

1/2 cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups flour

1 bag chocolate chips

1 cup nuts

For frosting, use pre-made lemon icing

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. In a large bowl, beat margarine, sugar

and vanilla until light and fluffy. Stir flour to blend well. Shape dough

into balls, flatten and place on ungreased cookie sheet. Space about an

inch apart. Bake for 18 minutes. Cool on rack.

Sandwich together with lemon frosting. Melt semisweet chocolate chips

in the microwave. Dip half of sandwich into melted chocolate. Roll in

chopped nuts.

THIRD PLACE: Snowball Cookies

Yields four dozen cookies

1 cup Blue Bonnet Margarine

6 tablespoons 10X (confectioners’ powdered) sugar

2 cups flour

2 cups finely chopped pecans

Extra 10X (confectioners’ powdered) sugar for rolling

Cream margarine and 6 tablespoons of sugar until fluffy in

amedium-sized bowl. Stir in flour gradually, then pecans until

well-blended. Chill several hours, or until firm enough to handle.

Roll dough, a teaspoon at a time, into 1-inch size balls between palms

of hands. Place 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake in slow

oven (325 degrees) 20 minutes, or until lightly golden. Cool on cookie

sheets 5 minutes. Remove carefully.

Roll in sugar in pie plate while still warm to make a generous white

coating. Cool completely on wire racks.

Store with wax paper or transparent wrap between layers in a container

with a tightfitting cover.