Springerle Cookies for Christmas

...

Every few years, Robb and I get the crazy idea to make springerle cookies.

This is always an insane and over-ambitious undertaking.

If we don't share photos of our cookies in a few days, you'll know that we weren't very successful.

My father grew up in a wealthy household in Hungary, with a staff of domestic servants. There's a story about their cook, that when she was making streudel, everyone stayed out of the way. The process was so difficult, and her swearing was so blistering that nobody wanted to cross her path until the streudel was done. Making springlerle is a lot like that.

As for my family fortunes ... all that was lost when the Russians rolled their tanks across Eastern Europe, at the end of World War II. My family was declared "enemies of the state." My father fled across a heavily fortified border. His brother spent years in a Russian prison. My grandparents lived under house arrest. It was a difficult time, to say the least. As you can imagine, I have great compassion for immigrants, and am appalled by the current xenophobic rhetoric among some American politicians.

Happy Holidays, y'all!




(Robb says, "Xeonophobic politicians should just eat a cookie, and chill the @&#$ out.")