Come December, groups of friends, colleagues and relatives gather to share the fruits of many kitchens, divvying up dozens of homemade gingerbreads, bars, drops and jumbles for each participant's respective household and gift list.

While the holiday cookie exchange has become an increasingly popular tradition, it appears to have no specific point of origin.

"My suspicion is that cookie exchanges have been happening unofficially within families for generations," says Lucy Long, chairwoman of the foodways section of the American Folklore Society and assistant professor of popular culture at Bowling Green State University.

"Particularly in extended families living in the same place, you tend to have different members of the family specializing in different foods, so people would trade back and forth."

The contemporary version of the cookie exchange may serve as a substitute for those who don't have large extended families close by, Long says.

An annual cookie swap emerged as an offshoot of Jessica C. Brown's book club. Brown remembers as a child an entire day devoted to holiday baking with her parents, siblings and their friends. After her marriage failed, Brown, a new mother, resurrected the tradition two years ago. "It was a way for me to stay connected to my friends and to thank them for their help" at a difficult time, the Rodgers Forge resident says.

While a cookie exchange reduces labor and costs, "It's much more a way of sharing each other's identity and heritage," Long says. "What tends to happen with things like holiday cookie recipes, ... people want to bring out their very best cookie, their favorite cookies. A lot of times what is the favorite and most meaningful is what they remember from their own childhoods."

Brown's contribution to this year's exchange was pizzelles. "My Italian mother always made them, and now I even have her not-so-safe pizzelle iron to make mine." Another favorite at Brown's cookie exchange is Mandy Katz's gingerbread men.

When Keith Collora teaches a Christmas cookie class at A Cook's Table in Baltimore, he includes an easy butterscotch-cookie recipe from his mother that also works well for exchanges.

Nancy Baggett adapted a number of family recipes for her latest collection, The All-American Cookie Book (Houghton Mifflin, 2001, $35). The Ellicott City resident remembers cookie-baking sessions involving her mother, aunt and grandmother that were precursors to the contemporary cookie exchange: "Everybody would get to take away some of everything."

Sherry Trabert has never participated in an official cookie exchange, but after years of single-handedly preparing dozens of Christmas cookies she began to get together with two sisters for a marathon baking day.

Generally, Trabert prepares and freezes as much dough as possible ahead of time, streamlining the production of 60 dozen cookies as well as a large batch of stained-glass candy. "It's something we really look forward to," Trabert says. "We spend time together and just have fun." This year, her niece will also serve on the cookie crew.

Some cookie exchanges are more intense than others. The Baltimore Women's Culinary Society's cookie exchange began "as a fun little thing," but, "now it's a bloodthirsty competition," participant Diane Neas says.

While tried-and-true family recipes work for most cookie exchanges, culinary society members, most of whom work in the food profession as chefs or consultants, go for the fanciest French butter, the choicest chocolate and the most labor-intensive cookie-decorating methods.

Neas says she can't compete with her colleagues, so she chooses a relatively simple recipe (Butter Diamond Cookies from her mother) and prepares it "with the best possible ingredients you can get."

Whatever your approach to cookie exchanges, Baggett offers several dos and don'ts:

Do be prepared to explain the history of your cookie offering. "It makes the cookies seem more special."

Provide containers for taking cookies away. Ideally, use separate tins for spicy and mild, or crispy and gooey cookies.

Don't bring store-bought cookies if others are going to the trouble to bring homemade masterpieces. "I have found that people who are good cooks have in several cases become disgruntled when they went and made cookies from scratch ... and got store-bought, sliced ones back."

Here are several cookie recipes. Some are cookie-exchange favorites; others are family favorites; and some are both.

Gingerbread Men

Makes 5 dozen

1 cup sugar

3/4 cup butter, softened

1/4 cup molasses

1 egg

2 1/4 cups all-purpose, unbleached flour

2 tablespoons baking soda

1 tablespoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon ginger

1/2 teaspoon cloves

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

TOPPING:

1/4 cup sugar for sprinkling; or, for a glaze, use powdered sugar mixed with milk to drizzling consistency

Beat 1 cup sugar, butter, molasses and egg until fluffy. Stir in remaining ingredients (except topping). Separate into three portions, wrap in plastic and refrigerate at least 1 hour.

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Roll out first portion until very, very thin and cut with gingerbread-man cookie cutter.

If you want a crackly sugar topping, brush top of gingerbread with a damp pastry brush and sprinkle with sugar. If you want a drizzle or to decorate each cookie, skip the pastry brush and sugar.

Cookies may be placed very close together as they will not increase in size. Bake until set - approximately 8 to 12 minutes. Cool on wire rack.

To decorate with drizzle, combine powdered sugar and milk until thin and place in a piping bag. Decorate by outlining gingerbread man or by creating swirls or stripes.

- Mandy Katz

Caramel-Pecan Triangles

Makes about 4 dozen

CRUST:

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar

3/4 cup melted butter

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon bourbon

1/2 cup flour

1/2 cup cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

FILLING:

3/4 cup butter

1/2 cup dark corn syrup

3 cups brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup heavy whipping cream

2 tablespoons vanilla extract

1 teaspoon bourbon

3 1/2 cups toasted pecan pieces (see note)

Line a 13-inch by 9-inch baking pan with foil. Grease bottom and sides well (don't skip this) and set aside.

For the crust: Beat 1 cup brown sugar, melted butter, eggs, vanilla and bourbon in a bowl at medium speed until smooth. In a separate bowl, combine flour, cocoa and salt. Gradually add to brown-sugar mix, beating until blended. Spread into prepared pan and bake at 375 degrees for 15 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

For the filling: Bring 3/4 cup butter, syrup, 3 cups brown sugar and salt to a boil, stirring constantly until a candy thermometer registers 250 degrees (hard-ball stage). Remove from heat. Quickly stir in whipping cream, vanilla and bourbon until blended. Stir in pecans and pour all over the crust.

Bake at 375 degrees for 25 minutes. Cool on a wire rack, then chill overnight or at least 8 hours. Lift foil from pan, peel foil off, then cut caramels into 1 1/2 -inch squares. Cut the squares diagonally into triangles. Store in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

Note: To toast pecans, preheat oven to 400 degrees. Spread pecans out on a cookie sheet and bake for 10 to 15 minutes or until fragrant. Watch carefully, remove to cool and turn oven back to 375 degrees.

- Sherry Trabert

Butter Diamond Cookies

Makes about 2 dozen

1/2 pound butter

1 cup sugar

1 egg yolk

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups flour

1 beaten egg white

2/3 cup chopped pecans

Cream butter and sugar together. Add egg yolk and vanilla. Mix in flour, spread and pat down into a (15-inch by 10-inch) jellyroll pan or cookie sheet with sides. Brush on egg white and sprinkle pecans over cookie dough.

Bake in 325-degree oven 30 minutes (until golden in color). Cut into diamonds while hot and cool in pan.

- Diane Neas

Butterscotch Cookies

Makes about 2 dozen cookies

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sifted flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup soft butter

6 tablespoons granulated sugar

6 tablespoons brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon maple syrup

1 teaspoon water

1 egg

1 cup rolled oats

1 cup butterscotch bits, crushed

1/2 cup chopped nuts

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Sift together dry ingredients. Cream butter, sugar, maple syrup and water. Add egg and mix well. Add flour mixture and oats to batter. Stir in butterscotch bits and chopped nuts.

Drop cookies onto a parchment-lined cookie sheet in desired size. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes.

---- Keith Collora

Italian Chocolate Pizzelle

Makes 30 cookies

3 eggs, beaten

3/4 cup sugar

3/4 cup butter or margarine, melted

1 1/2 to 2 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons vanilla

1 teaspoon anise seed or extract

3 tablespoons cocoa

3 tablespoons sugar

powdered sugar for dusting

Add and beat first seven ingredients together in order listed (use the smaller amount of flour for thinner pizzelle). Mix together cocoa and sugar and add to batter. Drop by rounded spoonful onto center of preheated grid of pizzelle iron. Close lid and immediately clip handles together. Allow to cook until steaming stops - about 30 seconds. Remove with fork and allow to cool on wire rack or towels. Dust with powdered sugar. Store in an airtight container.

- Jessica C. Brown

Snowflakes

The dough for this recipe may be made ahead and stored in the freezer in a plastic bag.

Makes 8 1/2 dozen

4 cups flour

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1 cup butter

1/2 cup Crisco

1 1/2 cups white sugar

2 eggs

2 tablespoons lemon juice

confectioners' sugar, sifted

Stir together flour, baking powder, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg. In a large mixer bowl beat butter and Crisco just to soften. Add sugar and beat until fluffy. Add eggs and lemon juice. Beat well. Add flour mixture. Mix until well blended. Chill or freeze.

Roll out dough, cut with six-sided cutter, 2 inches by 3 inches. Poke decorative holes into cookies with two different sized straws. (Sherry Trabert uses coffee stirrers and a turkey baster.)

Bake at 375 degrees for 10 minutes or until edges are lightly browned. Remove right away and cool.

Dust with confectioners' sugar.

- Sherry Trabert

Jam Jewels

Makes about 50 cookies

2 1/2 cups all-purpose white flour

scant 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup unsalted butter, slightly softened

scant 1 cup powdered sugar

1 large egg yolk

one 3-ounce package cream cheese, slightly softened and cut into chunks

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

TOPPING:

about 2/3 cup chopped pistachios or chopped slivered almonds, or a combination(optional)

assorted seedless jams, such as cherry, plum, raspberry, blackberry and apricot

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease several baking sheets or coat with nonstick spray.

In a medium bowl, thoroughly stir together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt; set aside. In a large bowl, with an electric mixer on medium speed, beat together the butter, sugar and egg yolk until fluffy and well blended. Beat in the cream cheese, vanilla and lemon zest until evenly incorporated.

Beat or stir in the flour mixture until well blended and smooth. Let stand for 5 to 10 minutes, or until the dough firms up just slightly.

Shape portions of the dough into scant 1-inch balls with lightly greased hands. Dip the tops of the balls into the pistachios or almonds, if using. Place, nut side up, on the baking sheets, spacing about 1 1/2 inches apart. Using your thumb or knuckle, press a deep well into the center of each ball. Place about 1/4 teaspoon jam in each well.

Bake the cookies, one sheet a time, in the upper third of the oven for 9 to 12 minutes, or until the cookies are tinged with brown at the edges. Reverse the sheet halfway through baking to ensure even browning.

Transfer the sheet to a wire rack and let stand until the cookies firm up slightly, 2 to 3 minutes. Using a spatula, transfer the cookies to wire racks. Let stand until completely cooled. Wipe off the sheets and regrease them before reusing.

-- From "The All-American Cookie Book" by Nancy Baggett