I lawn bowl at the Frick Park Lawn Bowling Club every summer (full disclosure: I do more than just bowl; I also sit on the board of directors). It's a wonderful sport -- the kind of game where you don't even realize you've exerted effort until after you're done and you realize that between rolling those bowls (as the lawn balls are called) and walking back and forth across the green, you've gotten some decent exercise and enjoyed chatting with friends to boot.

After the matches are over, we continue to enjoy robust and free-ranging conversation during Cookie Night, which occurs every other Wednesday.

When I first joined the club two years ago, I was told that traditionally, the "ladies of the club would bake something" and that if the men brought something, it was usually baked by their wives or picked up from the grocery store.

I took that as a challenge and showed up at the next Cookie Night with my own blueberry muffins. I don't think I sparked much of a revolution, as the general rule still holds true. Not that it really matters; regardless of where the cookies come from, eating them is always fun. But, let's face it, there's always something special about somebody baking for you.

Jeff Lederer, for instance, follows the club "rule" on cookies to a T when he volunteers that he could bake frozen cookies, but if we want something better, his wife, Ilene, would have to bake it.

She was kind enough to make meringues for a recent cookie night: "Birnbaum and Lederer's Forgotten Cookies," as his family calls them. They're "forgotten" because they're best left to cool in the oven overnight, where they might slip one's mind.

The recipe dates to Jeff's grandmother, Rosa Birnbaum, who perished in the Holocaust. The recipe came to the United States in the 1930s with Jeff's mother, Helen.

Hannah Wilson makes an amazing shortbread. Containing just three ingredients and three sentences of instruction, the recipe seems like it ought to be a snap. But to do it right, you have to learn the technique -- something that's easier to do if you grow up seeing it done. Hannah says, "My sister and I always used to say that you have to be Scotch in order to make shortbread."

Ann Hofer's cheese rolls, on the other hand, are really as straightforward as they come yet have as their base the most unlikely of ingredients: sliced white bread with the crusts cut off. Instead of being passed down through the generations, this is a recipe that was passed up -- Ann got the recipe from her sister-in-law, who got it from her daughter.

While there's a fairly tight community that has grown on the greens in Frick Park over the past 70 years, it readily welcomes anyone who wants to try a hand at bowling. (Learn more about it at lawnbowling.net.)

You're welcome to join us on Cookie Night when, after doing our best with our bowls and the greens, we munch on cookies and sip decaf coffee and tea, exchanging stories about trips taken (such as the Halls' encounter with a cow moose who had enjoyed too many meals from human hands), gardens planted (Mary Laverne's is so well kept it ought to be featured in a magazine), or the dogs that charged onto the greens through the open gate.

A gentle breeze stirs the trees, and we enjoy being outside on a summer evening as the sun dips below the horizon. No hustle, no bustle -- just a relaxing end to a long day.

WILSON FAMILY SHORTBREAD

• 1 pound butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 5 to 5 1/2 cups flour

Preheat oven to 300 degrees.

Cream butter and sugar. Gradually add flour. Spread evenly into 11-inch-by-17-inch pan and bake for 1 hour.

BIRNBAUM & LEDERER'S FORGOTTEN COOKIES

• 2 egg whites
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon lemon juice
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 6 ounces chopped nuts, dates, raisins, and/or chocolate bits

Preheat oven to 275 degrees.

Beat egg whites until frothy, then add salt and lemon juice. Continue beating until almost stiff, adding sugar a tablespoon at a time while beating egg whites until they hold stiff peaks. Fold nuts, dates, raisins and/or chocolate into egg whites. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or a brown paper bag. Spoon dollops of mixture onto the prepared surface. Bake for 45 minutes, then turn oven off (without opening the door) and let them cool overnight.

CHEESE ROLLS

• 1 large loaf of sliced white bread (as square a loaf as possible), with crusts trimmed away
• 1 pound cream cheese
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup butter or margarine, melted
• 1 cup sugar mixed with 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Roll slices of bread flat with rolling pin. Cream together cream cheese, sugar and egg yolks. Mix in vanilla.

Spread the mixture onto the flattened bread slices and roll them up like mini jelly rolls. Dip in melted butter or margarine, then roll in sugar and cinnamon mixture. Put seam side down on ungreased cookie sheet and freeze for about 1 hour. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and bake for 30 to 35 minutes. Remove cookies to cooling rack.