Fleur-de-Swiftyat70

Subscribe to continue reading

Subscribe to get access to the rest of this post and other subscriber-only content.

Already a subscriber?

Fleur-de-Grammy’sCookies

I didn’t send Christmas cards and neglected to bake cookies. But I might have started a new holiday tradition.

I picked up my phone and made calls to family members to ask what they were baking.  It was my way of observing and appreciating tradition from afar.  No bowls or baking sheets to wash, and fewer calories

And the winner was … Grammy’s Cookies.  These are often called Pinwheel Cookies that swirl with contrasting light brown sugar and cocoa-darkened dough.  In our family, they were our Polish grandmother Stella Wrobleski’s trademark. 

The beauty of these cookies is that you can make the dough ahead, roll them up, wrap in waxed paper, and stack the logs the freezer.  When you have guests coming and want to make the house smell like freshly baked cookies, you just pull out a cookie dough log, slice off thin sections, place them on a cookie sheet and bake for 10 or so minutes. Mmm,  warm cookies, just out of the oven.

My sister Lisa baked Grammy’s Cookies with her own twist and eyes on health—egg free. Instead of an egg, she uses a substitute: 1 Tbsp. ground flax seeds soaked in 3 Tbsp. water until the mixture thickens.  If you’ve never had the originals, the egg-free Grammy’s Cookies “pass with flying colors,” she says.

Her daughter, Lia, who lives in Vermont with her new husband Luke, wanted to make Grammy’s Cookies to take to her Boston in-laws. But … they had to be gluten-free. So, she made them with cassava flour. Lia proclaimed the end result “Just ok.”

On the other side of the Atlantic, several years ago Marina said she was thinking of changing the name of Grammy’s Cookies to “Auntie’s Cookies” because, although she has a small European freezer, the freezer cookies were so convenient when nieces from Charleroi and Antwerp came to visit in Ghent. 

Well, in 2023, Momma Marina is still baking Grammy’s Cookies, but with a Belgian flair. She added Speculoos spice mix.  (Speculoos biscuits are ginger cookies that accompany each cup of coffee at Belgian cafés). The end result was Grammy’s Cookies that tasted “Christmasy.”

I can feel Stella smiling down from the Heavens, fascinated to learn the ways her cookies are being interpreted by grandchildren and great-grandchildren in the 21^st century. Laurie Lynch

Recipe Card Re-Do: This little survey did point out the importance of one thing—the rotten shape of my recipe cards.  Some were actually browned (did I bake them?), splattered with pasta sauce (stirred with too much enthusiasm?) or written in terribly faded ink. Sometimes I had to use readers and a magnifying glass to decipher them. So, my New Year’s project has been making sure all of these treasured family recipes are legible for my great-grandchildren. 

Lais and James

Grammy’s Cookies

Mix 2 cups light brown sugar with 1 cup soft butter thoroughly. Add 2 eggs and beat well. Add 1 tsp. baking soda, ½ tsp. salt, and 1 tsp. cream of tartar to 3 ½ cups sifted flour. Work mixture into batter.

Add ½ cup chopped walnuts mixed with a little flour.  Add 1 tsp. vanilla.  Take about half of the dough and add enough cocoa to give it a good chocolate color. Roll light dough between two pieces of waxed paper (about 12”x16”). Then repeat with the chocolate dough. Chill for a short time in the freezer so that waxed paper can be easily removed.

Remove top layer of waxed paper from both; turn over and lay the chocolate dough on top of the light dough. Remove top layer of waxed paper. At long end, begin rolling dough together to form a long roll, creating a pinwheel effect. Roll can be elongated and cut into shorter lengths for easier storage. Rolls should be chilled in freezer until firm enough to slice thin cookies. Bake on greased cookie sheet in 350-degree F (175 C) oven for 12 minutes or until golden brown.

Fleur-de-GazingTree

I call it the gazing tree.

Whether I’m looking out my living room window or sitting on the bench on my front deck, my eyes settle on its domed shape.

The other conifers that spill from the mountainside into our neighborhood have steeples pointing into the heavens.  The gazing tree has a rounded top created by life scars, I’m guessing. It’s a Norway spruce (Picea abies) planted one street over, yet it calls to me—in the moonlight, in mist or snowflakes, on sunny, blue-sky days. Its branches reach out like uplifted arms, welcoming birds into its shelter, creating an arch of protection. 

As I sit here staring, a memory surfaces.  It is like the pigeon tower of Qatar. 

No, I’ve never been to Qatar.  But in September 2022 Marina took me to the horticultural world’s fair called Floriade in The Netherlands.  Counties from around the world shared exhibits showcasing their botanical culture.  Qatar featured a tall dome dotted with wooden pegs and hundreds of holes for nesting pigeons.

The conical pigeon towers made of mud bricks are built in fields of the Arabic world to provide shelter, shade, and breeding areas for thousands of pigeons at a time. The solid lower walls provide protection from snakes; the pigeon-sized holes above prevent birds of prey from entering. Pigeon dung collects at the bottom of the tower and is shoveled out and sold to farmers to fertilize their orchards and melon patches.

I’ve been housebound for almost two months.  Thank goodness for library books, mind travel, memories, and a gazing tree to channel my imagination. 

 Foot surgery No. 3 is completed. Stitches out, cast off, boot on (occasionally).  Borrowed knee scooter on its way to another patient. Glow-in-the-dark walker with tennis balls and I have become one. Counting steps and occasionally reach 1,000.  Physical therapy starts next week, and maybe Trek Sticks and anti-gravity treadmill.  I’ve handed off the 60s baton to my youngest of five sisters and have embraced 70.  Sort of.  Laurie Lynch