What you see is what you get in 101 Easy Peasy Cookie Recipes, a sweet (literally) and simple cookbook that will be a welcome addition to anyone’s library. Since so much attention is paid to high-priced and extravagant food, it is actually refreshing to find a cookbook that relies on the old-fashioned pleasure of a cookie to satisfy one’s desire for a classic dessert. Here, the added bonus is that the authors provide clear, concise directions which will make it easy for even novice chefs to whip up a delectable treat.

The cookbook is divided into five major sections, each of which is packed with recipes that cover a wide spectrum of ingredients and flavors as well as all levels of culinary skill. As a starting point, one can decide whether they wish to prepare bar cookies, drop cookies, no-bake cookies, rolled cooked or shaped cookies - and then focus on the challenge of making a final selection about what to prepare.

Recipes for decadent cheesecake bars and strawberry strips can be found in the chapter on bar cookies, and root beer frosties (one of my favorites!) and cherry coconut cookies are examples from the chapter dedicated to cookies that are prepared by merely dropping the batter on a cookie sheet. If you decide to forgo the use of an oven, you can go directly to the chapter on no-bake cookies to find the instructions to prepare chewy cereal bars and peanut butter crunchies. Soft sugar cookies and cream cheese cut-outs are those desserts that need to be rolled, and frosty pink lemonade cookies and pecan jewels fit perfectly into the chapter on cookies that need to be shaped.

It is so easy to just grab a package of commercially-prepared cookies while rushing down the supermarket aisle that we often forget about the decadence of a home-made cookie that takes minimal effort and time to prepare. 101 Easy Peasy Cookie Recipes is a perfectly scrumptious reminder of how just a little bit of effort can go a long way.