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Cookies are among dessert favourites because they are easy to bake. In the United States of America and Canada, a cookie is a small, flat-baked cake. In most English-speaking countries outside North-America, the most common word for cookie is biscuit. In many regions, both terms are used, while in others, the two words have different meanings: A cookie is a bun in Scotland or a form of rough-textured biscuit similar to the biscuit, while in North America a biscuit is a kind of quick bread.

Types of cookies

There are six different types of cookies, which are classified by the way the dough is handled. These types are: drop, bar, rolled, refrigerator, pressed and moulded.

Source: baking.about.come and wow.wikipedia.com

Bar Cookies

These are prepared by putting the dough in a rectangular pan. They are baked and then cut into squares. Most drop cookie recipes can be converted to this type of cookie. These are the easiest cookies to make, because several batches are baked at once.

Drop cookies

These are the easiest individual cookies to make. Balls of dough are dropped from a spoon onto a cookie sheet.

Moulded Cookies

A dough is formed by the hands into shapes such as wreaths, crescents, canes, or balls. Balls are sometimes flattened with the bottom of a glass.

Pressed Cookies

These are made by pressing the dough through a cookie press or pastry tube to form different shapes.

Refrigerator or Icebox Cookies

These are prepared by shaping the dough into long rolls and then refrigerating them. Once cold, the dough can be sliced and baked. This is a great prepare-ahead-of-time dough because it can also be frozen.

John Deere Truck cookie