Grandma's Mountain Cookies

Restaurant: Grandma's Mountain Cookies

Cuisine: Bakery/Desserts
Last visited: Oct. 10, 09
Area: Estes Park, Colorado
217 W Elkhorn Ave
Price Range: $10 or less

1: Poor 2: OK 3: Good 4: Very good 5: Excellent 6: Tres Excellent!!

Food: 3
Service: 2
Ambiance: 3

Overall: 3
Additional comments:

• Since 1998
• Specializes in really soft 1/4 pound cookies
• Baked daily fresh from the oven
• Sandwich cookies available
• Very limited seating - eat it, maybe 1 table and a few chairs
  
• Online ordering available
• An expensive cookie

** Recommendation: Muffins...you were expecting me to say cookies? I thought the muffins were better. If you want to try a cookie just depends on what you like.

Put the words "Grandma" in your restaurant name and I'm half way sold! With the name "Grandma's Mountain Cookies" and it's cottage like exterior and homey interior it was impossible not to try it out. It's on a touristy strip in Estes Park where there's tons of cute candy stores surrounding it - the word grandma and cookies...couldn't resist.

On the table:

• **Macadamia Mango Muffins 5/6
• I know what you're thinking...who goes into a COOKIE store and buys a muffin? It didn't even look that appealing. It was very home baked, wrapped in plastic wrap and sitting on the shelf.
• The reason I went for the muffin is because I've never heard/seen/tasted a Macadamia Mango Muffin! It's so exotic and unusual I just had to try it...where else am I going to find this? Except for maybe in Hawaii?
• Well let me just say I'm glad I got it because this was delicious!! The texture of this muffin is just insane. It tastes and feels like cookie dough! It's the softest muffin I've ever had! It was so moist...perfectly baked! Nice and fluffy...I have no idea how 'grandma' makes them this soft! Just holding it, my hand was sinking into it!
• The negative is that it didn't taste like mango at all. I think they used a mango syrup, but there were no pieces of mango at all. It just had the colour of mango. There was lots of pieces of Macadamia in it though which was nice. It also had giant crunchy sugar crystals on top. Nice and nutty but not too sweet, the sugar crystals I could do without though.
• 
• Mocha Chocolate Cookie 2.5/6
  
• I must say I was kind of disappointed. This 1/4 pound cookie cost $2.25USD and to be honest those English Bay cookies you get from the vending machine are bigger and better.
• YES it was incredibly soft - just like the muffins. It was -6 degrees and I bought this cookie from their display case set up outside and it was still warm and gooey!
  
• The points go to it being soft, because the flavour wasn't great.
  
• 
• It's an odd colour, kind of green/blackish because they use actual espresso or coffee grounds. It was more espresso than mocha tasting. It gave it an odd texture...it was so soft already that the grounds made it extra delicate and crumbly. They should have added a shot of espresso to the batter. The grounds made it distracting and overpowered the chocolate instead of enhancing it.
• They also added too much salt to the batter...to the point where the cookie actually tasted salty.
• Overpriced at $2.25 too...and 1/4 pound isn't actually that big although it sounds big.