These cookies (and cakes) are darn good.

• Position: WHAT'S NEW? Holiday Gift Guide - Chocolategourmet.com

When it comes to sweets, it takes a lot to impress us. Suffice it to say, we've eaten more than our share--some good, some bad, and oftentimes whatever's available--so it's rare when we come across something that is in a class by itself. But, truly, if we've ever tasted a cookie that lives up to its name, it is Damn Good Cookies from chocolategourmet.com, an online-only Chicago-based artisan bakery. They claim that these treats are "the kind you wish your mother would have made," and truer words were never spoken.

We sampled the collection of rugalach and, honestly, couldn't bear to share them. The three kinds are outstanding, though our favorite is the cherished cherry, with its crisp-cookie outside and moist cherry, pineapple, and coconut filling, dusted with cinnamon and sugar. Save your appetite apricot has a rich apricot and golden raisin filling covered in toasted pecans, and the hold my hand hazelnut is loaded with a decadent hazelnut, chocolate, and date filling, covered in toasted hazelnuts. Damn good cookies are bite-sized and come in five flavors: chubby wubby chocolate, overprotective pecan, rockabye raspberry, controlling coconut, and maternal macadamia nut.

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The bakery's Ugly Truffles, meanwhile, come in eight flavors and sport an odd collection of names such as homely hazelnut, put your clothes on chocolate, morning after merlot, messed up mocha, and not in mint condition. Visit www.chocolategourmet.com for more information.

Another tin of cookies that we simply could not get enough of came from Apple's Bakery in Peoria, III. Their motto is that "smiles are made from scratch" and that's exactly how they make their cookies. With...