Christmas Cookies 2016

I had big plans to mix up all of my Christmas cookie dough over thanksgiving weekend and then freeze it to bring out, cut, and bake over the next few weeks. That didn't happen Thanksgiving weakened, or the weekend after either, nor the one after that. All last week, I got butter out of the fridge to soften, only to put it back after I ran out of time or eggs or sugar. Finally, Thursday, I went on an epic mixing spree, and whipped up five batches of dough (the secret is to start with the lightest cookie—sugar—and end with the darkest—chocolate gingerbread—so you only have to watch the mixing bowl and paddle once, when you're done. In addition to my three staple Christmas cookies— the aforementioned sugar and chocolate gingerbread and spekulatius—I made two new kinds: chocolate sables, which are my all-time favorite cookie and which I made for the first time last month, and heidesand, which I just rediscovered after more than two decades.

My high school best friend's parents were from Germany, and a generation older than most high schoolers' parents. Her dad was a chemistry professor (retired, possibly?) and her mom did some translating work on the side of keeping a spectacular house. Inside the She was a stickler for rules and details—inside the medicine cabinet were labeled hooks for each person's toothbrush, including one for me; the juice jug in the fridge had a table that said "for breakfast only" and at that meal you were allowed only a tiny glassful. They weren't what I'd call rich, because they did not engage in conspicuous consumption, but they must have had money and they spend it well. They lived in a modest-sized house but it was beautifully proportioned and tastefully decorated; they were thrifty in their food expenditures (her mom bought generic, which mine never did, even at our poorest) but always served multiple dishes at breakfast and dessert after dinner; they drove sturdy but older cars (Subaru and toyota), but travelled to Europe and had a cabin in the mountains. They were intellectual and sophisticated in a way few people I knew at that time were—they listened to classical music, discussed politics, had extensive vocabularies (the first time I heard the word "turbid," was when her brother used it to describe the iced tea). They took me on my first trips to the ballet and the ski slope. I housesat for them when the bicycled around Europe after their children's high school graduation (my friend had a twin brother).

One year around Christmastime, my friend's mother invited me to their house for tea and cookies. Among the many beautiful and delicious cookies arrayed on the tray, were humble brown rounds. They didn't look like much, but they had a buttery, melt-in-your-mouth taste and a sandy texture. Mrs. Stickler told us the German name of the cookie and that it translated to "sandy moor." She also said they gained their sandy texture from browned butter.


My friend and went to colleges on different coasts and over the years we grew apart and out of touch, the way people do, especially back in the days before email and Facebook. I haven't heard from her in many years. I don't know if her parents, who were as old when we were in high school as my parents are now, are even still alive. But I've never forgotten those cookies, and now and then have tried to find a cookie called "sandy moor," with no luck.

Finally, this year, it occurred to me to enlist the internet. I tried Google translating "sandy moor." I tried searching "traditional German Christmas cookies." I finally got a hit with "German browned-butter cookies," which led me to this website, with a recipe for Heidesand—or "heath sand"—cookies. As I read the description and history of the cookies, tears poured down my face. I'm not sure why. Perhaps I missed my friend, and her family, who had opened up my world a bit. Perhaps I missed that time in life when mothers baked cookies and had tea parties. Perhaps I just really love browned butter, sugar, and salt.

I made a double batch, so certain was I that these cookies would transport me back to a time when I was 17. The browned butter came off without a hitch, and the dough came out every bit as crumbly and hard to work as the recipe said it would. I managed to work it into logs by scooping handfuls of dough crumbs into ziplock bags and mashing and rolling them into submission.

The next day I took the logs out of the fridge and attempted to slice them, upon which the disintegrated back into crumbs. I let them warm up a bit and tried again, with a larger, sharper knife, which helped some, though many slices lost chunks on their way to the cookie sheet. The recipe recommends rolling the edge of the cookie slices in pearl sugar. I didn't have any pearl sugar, but I did have some naturally colored red and green sugar, but it refused to stick to the cookies, no matter what I tried (I was tempted to lick the edges to make it stick, but don't worry, I didn't).

They aren't the prettiest cookies on the tray, but they are good, buttery and a little sandy. They're a little tough and don't quite have that melt-in-the mouth quality of Mrs. Stickler's. I think I might have overworked the dough, and sliced them a bit thick. The ones that I managed to stick a little sugar to are better; the sugar adds another texture layer of crunch and just a tiny bit extra sweetness to a not-too-sweet cookie. They're definitely going to become a regular member of the Christmas cookie line-up, though I might try some other recipes, to see if I can hit that perfect sandy sweet spot.

I realized that both the Heidesand and the sables are types of shortbread, and that I really love shortbread. Butter + sugar + flour + salt = yum! I'm thinking maybe I should write a cookbook of nothing but shortbread. I looked online and found that there's one (but only one) out there already (and appears to be out of print), plus a murder mystery and a romance with the word "shortbread" in the title. So maybe, after I finish up a couple of other book ideas, that will be my next project.

Not-Quite-Perfect Peppermint Bark

For a few years now, I've been working on perfecting my peppermint bark recipe, with the twinned goals of deliciousness and minimal labor. I thought I had the formula just right this time:

• 2 bars Green & Black's white chocolate
• 2 bars Green & Black's mint chocolate 
• small package Annie's chocolate bunny grahams
• a couple of scoops of tiny peppermint candies from the candy store

Unfortunately, I ran into a couple of problems when assembling my ingredients:

• The grocery store did not have G&B's white chocolate, so I had to buy the much more expensive bars at the health food store.
• I accidentally bought dark chocolate rather than mint chocolate
• I couldn't find chocolate bunny grahams anywhere and had to settle for Newman's Own chocolate alphabet cookies, which contain palm oil and left me feeling guilty about the rain forests
• the peppermint candies from the candy store were not as tiny as I had remembered

Undeterred by these setbacks, I forged ahead. My first time-saving plan was to break up the first bar of white chocolate and melt it on the pan in the oven. I pictured the pieces getting all soft and gooey, and easily spread with a spatula. Unfortunately, they turned brown and crunchy and not at all melty.

Not willing to waste that pricey bar of white chocolate,  I transferred the brown chunks to a hot water bath and added a couple scoops of coconut oil to help smooth out the mixture as it melted.


I then smashed up a couple tablespoons of the not-quite-small-enough-to-use-whole peppermint candies and added them to the white chocolate to help disguise the brown color, and spread it all on a sheet of parchment and placed the pan outside in the cold to firm up.

I then placed both chocolate bars in a hot water bath and Z helped me bash up the cookies, right in the bag (with a small hole to let out air) with a hammer. I added several drops of mint flavor to the melted chocolate (a step I could have skipped had I bought the mint bars) as well as the cookie crumbs, spread the whole mixture over the first layer of light brown white chocolate, and placed the tray back outside.

Then I melted the last bar of white chocolate (in a hot water bath, having learned my lesson), added a few more spoonfuls of crushed peppermints, and spread it over the hardened chocolate layer. Over the top, I sprinkled more mint candies, not bothering to smash those up, which I think might have been a mistake, because the final result is a lot for the teeth to handle.

I placed the tray outside one last time for a few minutes and then transferred it to the refrigerator while we all went to go see Fantastic Beasts. When we got home, I broke the bark into hunks and squirreled it away for holiday season munching.

And the best part about the bark being not-quite-perfect? We'll have to eat it all ourselves, in the privacy of our home, where no one else can see the brown layer, or break a tooth on the over-large peppermint bits, or notice how the chocolate cookies end up a little more soggy and less crunchy than the bunny grahams would have.

Some Things Do Get Easier

You know how when you have a crying little baby (or two), and everyone you see keeps saying, "It gets easier every day," (except that one person who said, "It gets easier for about two years, and then it gets harder until they're about five, and then it's easier again until they're teenagers,")? And as you go along, you find that, yeah, maybe it gets a little less physically demanding, maybe, but when the kid has a mouthful of potting soil or has climbed on the kitchen counter to get the big knife, it doesn't really seem all that much easier? And then they get older, and maybe you don't have to watch them that closely, so that's kind of easier, but everything's more complicated, like logistics of getting them from here to there and helping with homework and should you make them eat everything on their plate or just try one no-thank-you bite and how, exactly, are you supposed to handle sibling squabbles, anyway? And you think it doesn't get easier at all, only different. 

But some things, some things do get easier. 

Like ice skating.

I always thought I'd be the mom to get the kids out on skis and ice skates and backpacking in the mountains when they were little tots, but it's not that easy. In what was probably my worst idea ever, I took M to meet a friend at the outdoor ice rink in Augusta when he was four and the twins were eight months old. I got M into his skates, and me into my skates, and the twins into their double jogging stroller, and we all got about four yards out on the ice when M, who had been fully convinced he would do "twirls" like Brian Boitano, fell down and cried. And cried. And cried. And there I was, unstable on skates, with two babies in a stroller and a four-year-old wailing on his back on the ice.

We did not try skating again for a very, very long time. But now? Now we just walk down to the neighbor's pond, help lace up skates, and they skate. They fall down and get up and skate some more. No crying. No stress. Definitely easier.

Another thing that's easier: Making cookies.

I used to tie aprons around all three kids and pile them all into the learning tower and then manage the equitable measuring of ingredients. I guess it was fun. And no one lost a finger to the Kitchenaid, but it was a little stressful. Not so relaxing. Now? Now whoever is around and in the mood drags over the step stool and digs in. No more learning tower to stub my toe on (and to be in the way of the cabinet where all the bowls and measuring cups live). No more tussles over whether a teaspoon of vanilla is equal to a cup of sugar in terms of measuring equality. Also, they can arrange to cookie cutters to maximize dough usage. Much easier.

Another thing that's easier? 

Getting in the car when it's thirteen degrees below zero and turning the key and turning the key and pressing the gas and lifting off the gas and praying for the exact combination of turning and pressing and lifting that will get the damn thing to start and not having any babies in the backseat taking off their boots and socks, which was their favorite thing to do the winter they were little, which seemed to be a record winter for cold mornings and cars that didn't start and got stuck in snowbanks. Now, when the car doesn't want to start in the morning, they've already put on their own snowpants and coats and boots and hats and gloves and walked themselves up the driveway to catch the bus. 

Much, much easier.

Christmas Cookie Countdown

**With this December even nuttier than usual, I'm going to give myself a break and do a few posts that share a little link love with Christmas past. Enjoy!**

Once, when I was in high school, my best friend's mother invited my mom and me to their house for tea and cookies around Christmas time. I remember her tray of cookies must have had two-dozen different varieties. The only ones I remember distinctly had a granular texture and she told us the texture derived from browned butter, and their name translated from German as "sandy moors"  (I've been on the lookout for them ever since--the closest I've found is sevilles). But I do remember being amazed by the array. 

I also remember my own mother making several different kinds of rolled refrigerator cookies and pressed cookies and cutout cookies every Christmas. I'm sure my grandmother made dozens of cookies as well, but what I remember most was the candy tray on her sideboard--fudge and nut clusters and rum balls and peanut butter balls (I believe my grandfather played a role in making the candy).

When C and I first lived together, I would make tins of cookies and candies for his many extended relatives, at the time believing it was easier and or less expensive than buying them all gifts––I soon found out it was neither, and I also found out that it takes an awful lot of cookies and candies to fill one of those tins.

Nowadays, I try to keep things simple and minimal: three kinds of cookies, one batch made per weekend in the month of December and nibbled on throughout the month. If there are any left on Christmas Day, we'll put them out on a plate. If not, no big whoop. And now, instead of tins of sweets for extended (and extensive) in-laws, I give out socks.

Here are my three standard holiday cookies:

Spekulatius. Okay, maybe this cookie doesn't exactly count as simple, but now I've got the technique down, it's not hard, either. I make the dough the night before (as I do with all the cookies), and then I make a few St. Nicholases here and there throughout the day, keeping the cookie trays in the fridge until it's time to bake them (this year I started right after breakfast and took them out of the oven right before bedtime, but in-between, we got the tree and decorated the house).

Chocolate Ginger Bread. This is a Martha Stewart recipe, and while I often find MS recipes a lot of work with kind of meh results, this isn't one of them. It's a tad more work than traditional gingerbread, what with the fresh ginger and all, but oh so worth it.

Sugar Cookies. I know, everyone has their standby, but this recipe is so good, I've used it for 20 years and I love it so.

What are your favorite Christmas cookies (to make or to receive)? And do you have any idea what a sandy moor is?