2026, Business, Food, Kids, Mysteries

Derby Delights

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YA and I actually have a lot in common.  I probably mention the ways we are different more often than not – makes for better stories sometimes. 

Anyway, we both really like the Derby cookies that they make at Great Harvest Bakery.  Chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, pecans (plus all the other good cookie ingredients).  And they are huge – really too big to eat one a day, but yummy enough.

Great Harvest doesn’t make the derby cookie very often.  They make four or five cookies a month but for some reason they only make the derby a couple of months during the year.  At the beginning of every month, both YA and I scour the bakery’s monthly newsletter to see the monthly cookie listing.  I was expecting that we wouldn’t see our favorite until May.  I don’t know much about the Kentucky Derby but I do know that it’s in May.  YA was the first to see the newsletter this month and when I asked her how many I should get (the packages of six are a much better deal), she responded, two now and then maybe two the end of next week and two more at the end of the month.  She figured we can freeze any “overage”.  Like the two of us can’t eat 36 cookies in a month.  Snort.

Anyway, I obediently went up to Great Harvest today… ended getting three packages because once you purchase a certain amount at the bakery, you get a discount.  Did the math quickly in my head (and had the math confirmed by the bakery clerk) that buying one extra package of cookies actually made the price go down a bit.  Win/win.  I put one of the packages in the freezer for now. 

The capper to this story is that when I bought all these cookies and bemoaned the fact that the bakery doesn’t make them very often, the clerk concurred and also said that since the base of the derby cookie is the same as the base of a couple other cookies, we can special order our favorite on any month those others are made.  Which is most months.  Wish I had known this any time during the last several years!

Will you watch the Derby this year?  Will you wear a fancy hat?

18 thoughts on “Derby Delights”

    3. Has Great Harvest named their cookie specifically in reference to the Kentucky Derby or is that your assumption? What, I wonder, does a large cookie in Minnesota have to do with a horse race in Kentucky?

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      1. If you go online, you can find recipes for derby cookies, none of which are really close to the Great Harvest recipe. I would think if they named it after the Kentucky Derby they would have the cookies available in May not in March but I really don’t know. Or it’s possible that years ago when they first developed their derby cookie it was had to do with Kentucky Derby. Maybe it’ll go down as one of the great mysteries in life like Jimmy Hoffa and Amelia Earhart and the Voynich manuscript.

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  2. Husband’s stepbrother married a woman from a well to do family from Virginia on Derby Day. The wedding was in Virginia, and was quite the gala affair. I had no idea about the supposed significance of Derby Day, but it was discussed quite a bit at the wedding by the attendees.

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  3. Derby? No hat. No derby. But husband is in the process of acquiring new hearing aids so we will be at Costco for one of the fittings. Getting an appointment there is another kind of derby.

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    1. I believe that Derby Day is the first day of the Kentucky Derby. However, a short, very short Internet search did not confirm this.

      Quite a few years ago, my boss did a morale boosting/team building kind of thing where we each brought in a hat, and she provided all kinds of ribbon and fake flowers and silliness, and we all made derby hats. You know me – I’m up for all this kind of silliness so I had a good time, although several of my coworkers groused about it. And I did for a very short period of time think “maybe I’ll watch the Kentucky Derby this year while wearing said hat”, That didn’t happen and after a couple years, I dumped the hat that had just been sitting in the closet.

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  5. Yes, and no.

    I’ve always loved watching horses run, and somehow got hooked on watching the Kentucky Derby from a young age. But I’m not an avid racing fan and don’t care if I miss the other two Triple Crown races. Go figure. We used to make mint juleps on Derby Day to get in the mood, but that only lasted a few years. Maybe this year?

    No to #2 question because I hate wearing hats. I only wear them if necessary: cold weather or to cover my thinning hair while golfing around high noon in the six weeks either side of the Summer Solstice. I also wear them while golfing if I’m looking into the sun on a hole because, as we old folks know, our vision fades to where it’s hard to distinguish contrast or see when looking toward the bright lights of anything.

    Chris in Owatonna

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  6. OT. I have an 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle called the World of Shakespeare. It was kind of fun to do, but now that I’ve finished it, it is missing four pieces. My bad and we’ve looked everywhere … so here’s the question. Does anybody want an 1000 piece World of Shakespeare jigsaw puzzle missing four pieces?

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  7. We have a group of friends who have an annual Derby party; it is quite the event, and a lot of fun.

    None of the participants have the slightest interest in, or knows squat about horse racing. That of course, doesn’t stop us from handicapping and betting on the Derby. There’s even a trophy for the winner. The home made trophy is made by the previous year’s winner, and it can be quite elaborate, depending on the creator. The gaudier the better. There is also a trophy for the person who picked the fewest winners.

    It has been at least six or seven years since I’ve participated in this annual Derby party, and I don’t recall if there was money involved; if there was, it was minimal. I do recall having to scrounge up a fancy hat for the occasion, lots of good food, live music, and good conversation.

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  9. I like the header photo.
    We watch the derby. Kelly has always been into horses. I wouldn’t say they’re exactly ‘forced’ to run. Horses love to run, and these sure get taken care of..

    I’ve got a hat with a rainbow across the top. And one with bear ears on it. (not real!).
    But nothing that big or fancy…

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  10. I loved horses as a girl and read books about horses and racing. Since then I’ve learned how hard it is on the horses physically. There is a reason for the tape on their legs. They talk about horses having “heart.” They do like to run, and they seem to understand competition, but “heart”? I’m not sure I understand the usage in that sense. Maybe they just mean “will.” At any rate, I am not interested in seeing beautiful, intelligent animals hurt because humans like to be entertained. So, no. No derbies.

    I wore a fancy hat once, to a lunch with old friends. We all dressed up. The only fancy hat I wear these days is my MTI hat.

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