20 | December | 2012 | Teatime Romance

I’ve been wracking my brain for two weeks about what to post today, but all I’ve been able to come up with are worksheets on the midsegments of triangles and stress relief techniques—things I needed for my Geometry and Psychology classes. Then I thought, wait, this is easy! It’s the holiday season, and our current theme on Teatime is food. Where does that lead?

Christmas cookies.

We have our favorites in the Lee household. There are the peanut butter blossoms, peanut butter cookies with Hershey’s kisses pressed into the middle. They’re easy and very tasty, but my mother likes to leave them in the oven for just an extra minute or two, and they always end up crunchy (I like my cookies nice and soft). They do double nicely as make-shift protein bars with all that peanut butter, and taste so much better 😀

We also make cutouts with sugar cookie dough and homemade frosting (which consists mostly of powdered sugar). My sister and I reveled in making these when we were little, using all the odd cookie cutters my mother had (even the non-Christmas ones), and slathering frosting all over them. We’d even add sprinkles and small candies for detail—needles on Christmas trees, faces on Santa. I’m pretty sure there were sprinkle faces on the stars, boots, and stockings, too.

Then there’s my favorite: Grandma’s thumbprints. I am not at liberty to divulge the recipe, but they’re made from a very pretty brown dough rolled in chopped walnuts. About halfway through the baking, you take them out of the oven and press your thumb into the center of each cooking, making a beautiful divot in which to place just the right amount of frosting (and sprinkles, of course). Grandma passed away this summer, so this will be our first Christmas without her…and we’re making a double batch of thumbprints in her honor.

When I was very little, my other Grandma made lebkuchen at Christmastime. These are German gingerbread cookies, thick and cakey and a little spicy. Grandma and Grandpa moved to Florida years ago, so she hasn’t made lebkuchen for quite some time, but I’m thinking of prying the recipe out of her and trying my hand at them. No one else in my family likes them, though, and it’s not as much fun baking just for myself. On the other hand, it would be nice to have the house smelling like my childhood 🙂

This year my mother is determined to make something different in addition to our usual fare, but we’ve all been at a loss as to what it will be. There are so many yummy, interesting cookies to make that we’re having a hard time choosing. Do you have a favorite Christmas cookie? Extra credit if you share the recipe!