Ingrid Fritsch from: Fayetteville, Arkansas
I recently made these for my 9 year old son and his classmates for a “State Fair” at school. Each student presented information about a state. My son’s state was Hawaii. At the fair, each student provided food that had a connection to the state. My son provided Hawaiian Mood Cookies. They were a big hit.  They are soft, cakelike cookies (not hard and crispy) and taste like macaroons but with pineapple and maraschino cherries added.  A great aspect of the recipe here is that it uses “coconut”, instead of other nuts.  All of the other recipes that I found online include “nuts”, which usually suggests almonds or walnuts.  I have several comments on the recipe.  1. It is really important to press out as much liquid as possible through a sieve from the chopped maraschino cherries and the crushed pineapple before measuring them out for the recipe.  2. The cookies don’t store well, so it is best to make them fresh. I have kept them for several days at room temperature in a loosely closed container, but the cookies became much softer and sticky. 3. Improvement 1: My solution to the storage problem, in case it is not practical to make them fresh that day, is to not make them in the form of cookies of all, but rather put dollops of the dough in a minicupcake cup and bake for the same length of time in a minicupcake pan. That way, people expect the cakelike consistency (because they see a cupcake instead of a cookie), the baked cupcakes don’t stick to each  other upon storage, and they won’t be sticky to the touch (because the paper cup is where people hold them). Improvement 2: I placed a halved maraschino cherry on the top of the dough before baking (either the cookie form or the cupcake form). The cherry on top makes the cookies look even more beautiful than they already do.
June 15, 2009