I make a lot of cookies during the holiday season, which officially starts right after Thanksgiving. I sometimes try new things that sound interesting, but don’t taste nearly as good as I might have imagined. This leads to my typical effort to make the tried-and-true classics in the final days leading up to Christmas with sometimes mixed results.
My mom always made Biscotti Regina, which translates from Italian to the “Queen’s cookie” and is a popular sesame seed cookie you find in most Italian bakeries. She also made Russian tea cakes, which are very similar to Mexican wedding cookies and bourbon balls. Sugar cookies were another item on the list, never frosted, but decorated with just a smattering of sprinkled colorful sugar.
Admittedly, I have never mastered the plain, but surprisingly challenging sugar cookie. My aunt Betty was the queen of this cookie. I still dream about her thin, crisp, and slightly sweet cookies. I could eat an entire plate and barely feel full. I wish I could have taken the time to watch her make them, so I could perfect the recipe, but alas, I did not.
For my own cookies and treats, I always make pignoli cookies, which are made with pine nuts and almond paste; rainbow cookies, which are thin cakes layered together and sandwiched with raspberry jam and encased in chocolate; and homemade fudge – sometimes plain or sometimes with walnuts. The other cookies tend to be whatever suits my fancy for a given year. Last year, I made rugelach, which is a popular filled, baked creation popular in Jewish communities. I fell in love with rugelach in New York when my husband and I went to Zabar’s in the Upper West Side, and I tried the apricot filled treats. They are actually not exceedingly difficult to make and taste so delicious. They look like mini croissants and are usually made with cream cheese in the dough.
This week I made some cookies I saw in a recent edition of Bon Appetit magazine, including a diagonal jam bar and a tiramisu snowball, which has a coffee and mascarpone combination. I also made coconut pecan biscotti and chocolate rugelach. Finally, I decided to make Ina Garten’s chocolate dipped brown sugar shortbread cookies, which are very similar to a Milano cookie from Pepperidge Farms and are encased in chopped pecans!
Earlier in the season, I made chai snickerdoodles, which turned out great and were based on a visit I made with my friend Michelle to our local bakery, Black Market Bakers, where I devoured a HUGE cookie billed as the same flavor and loved it. Less popular in our household was an attempt at making a pink peppercorn and black sesame shortbread bathed in dark chocolate. John was not a fan and Luke said it would have been “terrible” if not for the chocolate. Not everything is successful!
To me, there is nothing better than the warmth of the oven and the smell of cinnamon and sugar throughout the house. It reminds me of happy times growing up and the many traditions we had as a family. Living as we did overseas during my childhood, I don’t recall there being an emphasis on cookies. In the UK, we had trifle for dessert, which I still make each year, but the cookies were always shortbread, a very rich buttery cookie that can sometimes be dipped in chocolate.
The one thing I have decided to make that I hope will be a nice surprise for my mom is a Cassata Alla Siciliana cake. This was the cake my mom always served for my birthday, and I know she made it from scratch and described it as a pain. Hopefully, mine is as good as her cake was! I guess we will find out!
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