Did you know that bee colonies kick the drones out at the beginning of winter? Apparently, they are dead weight because they drain honey reserves but don’t otherwise benefit the colony during cold months. (Drones are male bees. I feel like this is the bees’ answer to the patriarchy.)

Did you know that bees will go to the outside of the hive during summer when they get hot, clump up, and fan themselves? It’s called – wait for it – “bearding” because it makes the hive look like a face with a beard.

And worker bees and queen bees don’t really sleep like we do. They work for about 30 minutes, take a 10 minute break, and then begin working again. The cycle repeats over and over until the bee dies.

(If you’ve ever been a parent or had a full-time job, maybe you can relate.)

Julia has begun beekeeping. Can you tell?

Our mornings have been filled with fun facts like this, thanks in large part to the state apiarist, who is generously helping her figure out how to manage a colony successfully.

It reminds me of how lucky we are to live so close to a major university.

I hope you know me well enough to know that just because I introduced this recipe with bee facts does not mean the recipe is full of honey.

In fact, there’s no honey in it at all.

It stars sour cream, but we do not own dairy cows. (Nor do I want to get any, so please do not make any such suggestions, Husband Person.)

My friend Stephanie sent me the recipe last week.

She hadn’t tried it herself, she said, but she said they had her with “sour cream” and “short cut.” Those are the same words that caught my eye.

I used to love baking cookies. I’d double a recipe and stay up late watching over trays and trays of cookie sheets. The end result always seemed worth it.

But these days, I don’t really want to stay up late doing any type of work. I am tired. I work plenty. And I don’t like to add to the to-do list.

So I’ve become a big fan of bar cookies. The recipe for chocolate chip cookie bars that I’ve shared in this column has pretty much become the only type of chocolate chip “cookie” I make anymore.

The drawback with a lot of the bar cookie recipes is that they don’t age particularly well. It’s not that they go bad quickly, but they seem to me to grow stale a bit quicker than a regular cookie does.

But these sugar cookie bars are the Holy Grail of baked goods; what I mean by that is that they actually get better with age.

I know of only one other recipe like that, and it’s the one-bowl chocolate cake recipe on the back of the Hershey’s box.

I feel like most of the baked goods I make have a shelf life of just a couple days. After that, they’re edible, sure, but not nearly as delicious as they were on the first or second day.

Not so with these bars. I guess the icing makes them retain more moisture, but I thought they were richer and more delicious on day three than they were on day one. That almost never happens.

I did double this recipe and bake it in a half-sheet pan. I did not have enough ingredients to double the icing recipe, so the version I made had a very thin layer of icing over top.

I really liked them that way; it allowed the tang of the lemon and sour cream to shine through rather than being covered up by sugar.

However, to each her own. I am adjusting the recipe to more closely replicate the way I tried it, but by all means, double the icing recipe if that’s what makes you happy.

ICED SUGAR COOKIE BARS

(Adapted from thekitchn.com)

Ingredients
For the bars:
1 cup (two sticks) butter, room temperature
1/2 cup sour cream
1 egg
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice (about 1 lemon’s worth)
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

For the frosting (double this recipe if you prefer a thick frosting):
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
1 pinch salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups powdered sugar
Optional: food coloring; I used red to make a pink frosting
Optional: sprinkles

Directions
■ Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 9-by-13-inch pan with parchment or nonstick foil or grease pan well.
■ Place two sticks of butter and 1 1/2 cups sugar into a mixing bowl. Beat butter and sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy. Scrape down sides of bowl. Add sour cream, egg, lemon juice, vanilla and salt. Beat for an additional minute or so. (The mixture may look curdled.) Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add the flour and beat just until combined.
■ Spread batter evenly into prepared pan. (If you need to use your hands for this, wash them well and leave them wet. You’ll be able to press the dough down without having it stick to your fingers.) Bake for 30-35 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely.
■ While bars cool, prepare frosting. Beat together 1/2 stick butter, pinch of salt and vanilla. Add one cup powdered sugar, beat to combine, and add the second cup of powdered sugar. Add food coloring if desired. Once bars are cool, dollop the frosting over the top of the bars. Use an offset spatula to smooth the frosting out evenly. Cut into bars to serve.

Amelia Plair is a mom and high school teacher in Starkville. Email reaches her at [email protected].

Amelia Plair is a Starkville resident who writes occasional food columns.