Ruggalach and why I miss the old bakery by the school

I love ruggalach. (some spell these Rugelach, which is correct??)

Especially chocolate ruggalach. It has always been one of my favorite treats. I remember my mother coming home from the bakery every so often when I was growing up, with a box full of ruggalach.

Wonderful rich, flaky ruggalach with walnuts in them. We would always sit together at the table, snacking, talking. She would tell me stories about the ruggalach her mother used to make, a recipe that she, in turn, had gotten from my great grandmother. The most important thing, my mother always told me, was to bake ruggalach with walnuts. I agree, it just isn’t the same without them.

One day the bakery my mom used to go to closed, I didn't have any special feelings towards that bakery, but in the next couple of years we couldn't find any walnut-chocolate ruggalach, only either plain chocolate ones or cinnamon ones (yuck!).

I still enjoy trying ruggalach at every bakery I can find; you can say I’m on a quest for the Best Ruggalach money can buy. But none have been as good as the Ruggalach my grandmother used to make.

As you can imagine - I was delighted to come across these delicious rugelach at the cookie outlet.

New York Cheesecakes

My favorite cake is cheesecake, heck - my favorite food is cheesecake.

I remember the cheesecake my grandma used to make, she would never tell us how she made it. The most prized piece was the center piece. I never understood why, I guess it is a family thing. Actually - I never even figured out why there needs to be a center piece. Hmm.

I went on a quest for the best cheesecake, I compared David's with this Junior's Cheesecake from the famous Cookie Outlet. The cookie outlet forced me to use 2nd day air, which was more expensive than David's shipping - which was a little annoying.

Its a tough call, and I'm going to have to say it is a very close tie! I'm going to have to try this again, with a panel of judges, I can't do this again alone.

Can you beat the Italians' cookies

Italians make the best cookies! you can't beat them at that, Italian Cookies rule. There's nothing like a good old Biscotti to go with your morning coffee (which should also be Italian). And the only thing that could, maybe, beat that is an Italian Rainbow Cookie.

I've been buying all my cookies from the CookieOutlet in the past few years, I think my next project (or at least the next cookie related one) will be to decide which of the following three not so followed Italians is the best: the Lemon Fan, the Cherry Jelly Cookie, or the Candy Top, which is a little known chocolate cookie covered with round rainbow sprinkles. Yum!

What do you think? I'd love to get some comments on more less-famous Italian delights.