Recipe for a presidential center
Molly Shore
Former Burbank Mayor David Laurell is helping make the William J.
Clinton Presidential Center and Park a reality, and he’s doing it
with his wife’s chocolate-chip cookies.
Max Laurell’s Kahlua chip cookie recipe is one of several to
appear in “The Clinton Presidential Center Cookbook,” part of a
fund-raising effort to build the center in Little Rock, Ark.
David Laurell said he is honored to be in the company of Al Gore,
Muhammad Ali, James Carville, Whoopi Goldberg, Barbra Streisand,
Chevy Chase, Elizabeth Taylor and others who donated their favorite
recipes for the book.
Max Laurell says her husband deserves to be included in the
cookbook.
“I’m married to a special guy who was mayor of Burbank,” she said.
“He belongs right up there with them.”
Although David Laurell says his wife has only cooked twice since
he’s known her, she happens to be a terrific baker.
Max Laurell said that most people don’t believe the recipe is hers
because she hasn’t cooked since the night before the Northridge
earthquake.
“I bake [the cookies] two times a year, at Valentine’s Day and at
Christmas,” she said. “That’s why it makes it all the more special to
him.”
David Laurell first met Clinton in the 1980s, when Laurell was
working in Little Rock for the Arkansas Educational Television
Network. He said he has been a friend of Bill and his wife, Sen.
Hillary Clinton (D-New York), ever since.
“It was Bill Clinton who inspired me to public service,” Laurell
said.
The center, to be built on a 27-acre city park along the south
bank of the Arkansas River, will house the nation’s 12th presidential
library.
“They are magnificent institutions for people, especially young
people, to be able to go and appreciate our history and also realize
what role they can play in government today,” Laurell said.
To purchase a copy of the cookbook, log on to
www.clintonpresidential center.com/cookbook.html.