Black and white cookie

Black-and-white cookie

Alternative names	Half-and-half cookie
Type	Biscuit
Course	Dessert
Place of origin	United States
Region or state	Northeastern states
Main ingredients	Shortbread, fondant

A black-and-white cookie, or half-and-half cookie, is a soft, sponge-cake-like shortbread which is iced on one half with vanilla fondant, and on the other half by chocolate fondant.

Notably, this style of cookie is often seen as a particularly "New York" snack.

Although bearing a superficial resemblance to black-and-white cookies, half-moon cookies, popular in Central New York, are made to a significantly different recipe. The traditional half-moon cookie is a devil's food cake cookie with buttercream frosting, resulting in a cookie that is richer and moister than the black and white cookie. Half-moon cookies are now also available with a vanilla cookie base.

Names

Cookies of this style are collectively known as "black-and-white cookies" or "half-and-halves". In Germany they are called "Amerikaner" (American). On October 19, 2008, Barack Obama dubbed them Unity Cookies at a deli in Hollywood, Florida.

History and difference from half-moons

Box of Black and white cookies

The exact origin of the black-and-white cookie is unknown. The half-moon common in Upstate New York and New England is sometimes confused with the black-and-white cookie but is made with a different recipe. Nonetheless, while the two names are often used interchangeably, there are considerable differences between the two; most notably in the textures of the base and the icing, with black-and-whites having a drier, cookie-like base and fondant frosting. And with the cookie also being bigger than most half-moons.

Half-moons most often come with a chocolate cake base, dark fudge icing on one side and buttercream white frosting for the "half-moon" side. Hemstrought's Bakery in Utica, New York, one of the earliest known bakeries to make the half-moon cookie, also made a vanilla cake base with fudge and buttercream white frosting, as well as full "vanilla moons" , "coconut moons," and custom colors with either a chocolate or vanilla cake base. Hemstrought's Bakeries is located in Utica, NY where they still bake half-moons for their customers and local supermarkets.

The typical New York City and Long Island black-and-whites have a vanilla cake base with fudge and white frosting.

In popular culture

Black-and-white cookies are mentioned twice on Seinfeld, set in New York City. In the episode "The Dinner Party", Jerry eats a black-and-white cookie while waiting in a bakery with Elaine. He uses the cookie as a metaphor for racial harmony and that people should "Look to the cookie!" In the episode "The Understudy", the hospitalized Bette Midler asks Kramer for one after she is injured at the softball game, telling him, "If I don't get a black-and-white cookie, I'm not going to be very pleasant to be around!"

Gary Dell'Abate (Babba Booey) of The Howard Stern Show is commonly teased for eating black and white cookies on the air by Sal Governale

See also

• Cuisine of New York City