International Christmas Cookie Assortment

Hooked on baking cookies

Every Christmas Eve for many years our good friends Don Kleiner and Argy Nestor and their family arrived from Maine to stay at our house for the holidays. Using our place as home base, they spent the holidays with their two families and lots of between times with us.

Often Argy would bring Kahlua and Cream, and some Saga Blue Cheese and add them to our Spanakopeta and Fruit Salad and Raisin Swirl bread and, of course, cookies. I always saved some Finger cookies for Donald and Chocolate Nut Fudge for Argy.

By then I would have mostly finished delivering the holiday cookies but would save one box to drop off on Christmas Eve to “Mrs. Sterling”. This last delivery became a holiday tradition.

A homemaker to aspire to

I got along pretty well with my mother-in-law from the start, though I didn’t get really interested in what she knew, or what she could teach me about cooking until after Don and I had been married for a while and we moved into the house down the street from her.

There were many things about Elsie Feldeisen that were different from my mother. One of the good things, was that she did enjoy cooking, and made really good meals, with seasonings (tongue-in-cheek, here) and other interesting ingredients in them. She had a garden and cooked fresh vegetables and make pickles and jams. She loved to pick berries and make things with them to preserve for the winter.

And she made the most wonderful Christmas cookies and breads. Her cookies were a big production. She had more than a dozen cookie tins, marked with the name of the cookie they held. She had a routine for when she made which kind of cookie. When they were all done, she could put out a plate of cookies that held a dozen or more different kinds of cookies, pretty and delicious. She would package them in decorated coffee cans or aluminum pie pans covered with plastic and a bow, and take them to certain relatives or neighbors, every year. She would have a plate on the table at Christmas breakfast and after supper and get them out when people dropped over during the holidays. This is how I imagined a real homemaker- like those ladies in fancy dresses and aprons in my childhood cookbook- would live. This is something to aspire to!

I began collecting her recipes, for the cookies I especially loved. There was Kipfel, made from a yeast pastry rolled out super thin and filled with a cooked raisin filling. I was fascinated by these, enjoyed eating them at her house, but somehow never got around to adopting this giant recipe that seemed to take days to make. But I liked the Springerle made with lots of eggs and and flavored and rolled out with a special decorative rolling pin. She gave me a Springerle rolling pin for Christmas one year since I kept borrowing hers.

Date Squares, a thin and moist date-filled cake cut into squares and rolled in sugar. Peanut Blossoms were a peanut butter cookie with a Hershey’s Kiss stuck in the top, favorite of my daughter who ate the chocolate kiss and left the cookie behind. Sour Cream Cutouts were a rolled cookie, cut with cookie cutters and decorated with silver dragees and colored sugar.

There were quite a few more, another soft Date cookie, thin and crisp Oatmeal Cookies with red sugar on them, and others. Though she added new ones some years (Fudge Bars), or omitted less popular ones, the basic cookies remained the same for many years.

My own collection

I began experimenting with cookie recipes, trying to find new and different ones for my own cookie collection. One of the first I tried was a variation of the German cookie Lebkuchen, called Nurnberger, which I found pictured in Betty Crocker. This was made into circles and decorated with cherry halves and blanched almond halves in the shape of a flower and made a very pretty addition to my plate so I started making that every year.

I was particularly fond of the very short nut cookies called Viennese Crescents, rolled in powdered sugar. I tried the Greek variation and the Mexican variation of these cookies both made into rounds but always seemed to come back to the crescent.

I started making Springerle, and also a nice hard cookie that we liked to dunk in wine of coffee, Swedish Almond Rusks. I had a number of German cookies because of our family heritage, as well as the Swedish cookie. I began to look for things from other cultures so I could represent many countries. I found a London Fruit Bar, a Mexican Wedding cake (very like my Viennese Crescents), a Greek cookie. Polish Wedding Cakes, Italian cookies of all sorts.

International Christmas Cookie Assortment

(I apologize for this limited notion of “international,” as I was mostly researching cookies from the European-American tradition).

Within a short time of learning to make these things and adding a few different kinds to the selection, I was ready to try to sell them. I decided I could make a unique assortment of international cookies and sell them to a list of customers who came back every year for their several pounds of cookies. And that is what happened.

Early December

I made a list of groceries I would need. I began well before Christmas, buying cookie-making supplies as they came into the stores-candied cherries, citron, rum, different kinds of nuts. I bought pretty paper cups to put smaller or messier cookies into, bags of brightly colored chocolate kisses and peppermints to scatter among the cookies. I purchased one and three pound boxes at the restaurant supply store, and red, green, and white tissue paper. Before long, I decided to add fudge to the mixture and would sell it in 2 inch squares as part of the assortment if customers wanted it. That was always a big hit.

At the beginning of December I began in earnest, I needed to have a good assortment of cookies made by the middle of the month for parties. There were some cookies that liked to be aged, such as Springerle and Lebkuchen and Almond Rusks. I would make these first, and then add some of the quick but short lasting butter cookies.

I often made a batch each of Vanilla Pretzels and Butter Cookies. I’d divide the butter cookie dough into four parts and make thumb prints with raspberry jam, or a half of a maraschino cherry. Or roll them into balls and flatten with a decorative glass. I could use these plain or sandwich them with chocolate. Or press the dough with a star tip into a wreath shape, or other easy variations. With these, I’d have five different cookies for anyone who requested them for an early December party.

Then I started adding cookies, depending on how much was needed when. If I wasn’t using them, I’d freeze the butter-type cookies to keep them nice and fresh. I made rum-soaked currant cookies, date squares, candy cane- shaped cookies with pink and white ropes twisted together and sprinkled with crushed candy canes.

One day I’d make dough for gingerbread and let it chill overnight. Then I would roll it and cut into the shaped of cows and chickens and little gingerbread people. I always decorated these sparsely with white icing.

I would usually make up as many white boxes as I had orders each day, line them with colored tissue paper, place cookies in the boxes carefully until the box was the correct weight, then add some chocolate and peppermint decorations, I wish I had a picture, they were so beautiful. Tape the boxes shut, label them with a red marker and one of my business cards. Now they were ready for delivery or pick up.

Minimalism reaches my assortment

These days I have changed my standards. I don’t want to eat or bake nearly as many things as I did in my younger days. I got the idea from Aunt Joan, probably when she started to get over the excitement of baking massive amounts of cookies, too.

I’ll choose my four favorite recipes, the best of the best, and make a stellar assortment, varied in flavor, shape, texture and decoration. It’s a new kind of challenge or me. Think about it all year, what four would be my best choices? Could I slip in a 5th?

Despite minimalism, I still can’t see a cookie recipe without assessing it to see if it would fit in my assortment or if the recipe seems superior or has an ingredient I might try in a similar recipe. I’m hopelessly addicted.

The versatile butter cookie: a baking professional’s mainstay

Makes about 3 1/2 pounds

One pound (4 sticks)unsalted butter at room temperature

Cream this in mixer with 1 1/2 cup sugar

Stir in 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

And 2 large eggs and mix briefly.

Mix 4 1/2 cups flour with 1 teaspoon baking powder

Add to butter mixture gradually. Mix until well blended and empty onto counter in a ball. I find that chilling the dough overnight works well but it may not be necessary if you're in a hurry. Chill until it holds its shape for whatever decorations you’re planning. While the oven preheats to 400 degrees, you could

• Roll little balls, press your thumb in the center and fill with jam
• Roll into ropes and make tiny circles big enough to fit a whole or half maraschino cherry
• Put in a pastry bag and pipe tiny wreaths to decorate with green sugar and red cherry pieces
• Make small balls and roll into shredded coconut
• Make balls and press flat with the bottom of a glass dipped in egg white then sugar.. Re-dip after each cookie. Then after baking, leave some plain and sandwich some together (match them with same size cookies) with melted chocolate.
• Or whatever you create
• Bake at 400 degrees for 8–10 minutes

Nurnberger pictured below

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