#Delectable December: LE Franks Shares Christmas Cookies & Snow Globe
I’m thrilled to kick off Delectable December with my wonderful friend LE Franks. She’s local, though we’ve spent more time together at GRL and Bent-con than in San Francisco, at least so far. She mentioned her mother’s cookie recipe in Atlanta and I immediately asked her to participate in Delectable December, to share her love of food and holidays.
Even better, this year she’s also sharing her new Dreamspinner story, Snow Globe. Keep reading for two delicious recipes and an excerpt. Leave a comment for a chance to win one of the Delectable December prizes–donated by the other authors who will be visiting during December. (I’m still taking sign-ups. Fill in the form here to participate.)
Thank you EM for inviting me on your blog this holiday season to share one of my favorite memories of Christmas and news of my new Christmas short story, Snow Globe, out today from Dreamspinner Press
Here in the San Francisco Bay Area we don’t have the same environmental cues (like snow and ice) that help frame the holiday season–instead I have to draw on my memories of Christmases past to get me in the mood. Growing up, Christmas traditions changed with the venue—Living in the Mojave desert far from family we were always the travelers—we’d drive hours and settle into homes already filled with their own special brand of holiday cheer. But throughout the years, there’s been one tradition we claimed—my mother’s Christmas sugar cookies.
Back when my parents were newly married, there was no extra money to buy ornaments for their first Christmas tree. Instead, my mother found a rolled cookie recipe on the back of a bag of Gold Medal Flour. Unlike more traditional sugar cookie recipes, this one was something special—an almond flavored shortbread with a delicacy of flavor that shone under a glazing of sugar.
That first year my mother covered the Christmas tree with cookies cut in the shape of bells all decorated with powdered sugar icing, silver dragees, and colored sugar sprinkles. She describes a tree hung all over with the cookies that disappeared one after another from the moment the first one hit an evergreen branch. It was a huge success, one that was repeated on other trees during my childhood. And, while the cookies never lasted all the way to Christmas, the memories linger.
Now every time I make this recipe for my family I think of her, and of Christmas. I remember all the years we made these cookies together. The tin cookie cutters that rattled as I pawed through them looking for just the right shape to use—the Teddy Bear, the angel, the half moon…I loved them all. Even better, no eggs made the scraps of raw dough a child’s dream to eat.
These cookies are truly delicious, subtle and simple. They aren’t cloyingly sweet and bland like so many sugar cookies are. They use almond extract that provides a depth of flavor missing in most rolled dough.
For a festive variation I make a separate batch flavored only with peppermint extract and tinted red to make the red stripes of candy canes that wrap the almond flavored dough in a warm holiday embrace. I hope you try this recipe and make some memories of your own.
Silver Bells Christmas Cookies
1 cup soft butter
½ cup sifted powdered sugar
1 teaspoon almond extract
2 ¼ cup flour
¼ teaspoon salt
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Mix butter sugar, almond extract together
Stir in flour & salt (I incorporate the salt with the flour separately before adding to the butter mixture)
Roll ¼” thick. (I chill at this point. It makes the cookies easier to cut out and retain their shape while baking).
Cut with 2” bell shaped cookie cutter – makes aprox. 40 cookies (yeah, right. I don’t have my mom’s deft precision cutting technique. I double the batch and use whatever cutter strikes my fancy, though silver bells are pretty amazing.)
Bake for 10 minutes (edges should be lightly golden brown, centers pale.)
Cool, Frost with Thin White Icing (eat before someone else gets them.)
Thin White Icing
1 cup sifted powdered sugar
1–1 ½ Tablespoon Water
½ teaspoon vanilla extract (the good stuff, please people.)
Mix sugar and vanilla together, then thin with water until you have a loose consistency. It’s more of a thick glaze than an icing. Spread on cooled cookies then add decorations. Let them dry before eating, if you can. -LE
Snow Globe by LE Franks
My contribution to Dreamspinner’s annual Advent Calender, Snow Globe, is available December 1st. For more heartwarming tales, please check out this year’s Dreamspinner Press Advent Calendar selection of Christmas stories
It’s the story of Kris Hamilton, an artist who moves to a small town in Northern Minnesota looking for a home and a studio to create his snow globes. Kris’ first meeting with blond Viking-come-to-life, Tyr Tollefson is a disaster and it isn’t until Kris rescues Tyr’s mentally challenged older cousin Bun, that the pair start seeing eye-to-eye.
Excerpt from Snow Globe by LE Franks Available December 1st at Dreamspinner Press (and Amazon, other distributors shortly after):
IT WAS the face pressed against his storefront window that first caught his attention.
“Pressed” might have been too delicate a word. “Mashed” is better, Kris thought idly, admiring the spread of pink skin sticking to the glass before his brain latched on to the thought spinning and tumbling at an increasingly alarming rate.
The litany of words shoved their way to the tip of his tongue, rushing to spill over and out of him in a waterfall of frothing adjectives: smushed, squashed, scrunched, crunched, crushed, squished, pushed, flattened, pancaked…. He’d barely been able to throw on the brakes, limiting the torrent to a barely audible whisper until the words dribbled to a halt.
Crap. It had been weeks since the last time he lost control of his own peculiar form of Tourette’s.
He looked around the tiny store to see if anyone had noticed, but was quickly drawn back to the spectacle outside. The little voice teasing at the edges of his mind suggested a few more words that he ruthlessly rejected, fully alert to the insidious nature of his own brain. The person outside was an impossible mélange of old and young, tiny and broad, all brown and pink and white and fluffy red. Was that a scarf and hat?
Pompoms in July seemed off to Kris, and the noise came rushing back—odd, unusual, unexpected, surprising, strange, weird, astonishing, peculiar…. Gasping, he stuttered back a breath, choking in the words and squeezing eyes shut tight.
Twenty-five cleansing breaths. Twenty-four, twenty- three…. His head noise kept pace with his diaphragm until petering out around number twelve. Kris paid attention, waiting to open his eyes again until the countdown reached number one… or was it zero? He felt another tingle of panic try to erupt. Shit. If he wasn’t careful, he’d be off to the races again, and he could feel the happy little ponies inside him bouncing in delight at the thought.
This time when he opened his eyes, his world was still. No strange visions at his window, no customers with pity or contempt in their eyes, no rampaging word strings waiting to torment him. With shaking hands he put up the Out to Lunch sign and locked the front door.
Not for the first time, Kris felt like he was living inside one of his own snow-globe creations—never knowing when something was going to yank him upside down and shake him. At least for now, all the blizzarding shards seemed to have settled back to the bottom.
Buy Snow Globe from Dreamspinner Press and Amazon.
Find LE Franks Online:
Facebook: LE Franks Author page
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9 Responses to “#Delectable December: LE Franks Shares Christmas Cookies & Snow Globe”
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Thank you for sharing that lovely story about decorating the tree with Christmas cookies. And for the recipe – sounds delicious. My favorite holiday tradition is opening stockings on Christmas morning. When I was a kid and now with my kids, we always open the stockings first thing in the morning (usually still dark). Then, we have a big breakfast and open gifts leisurely after that.
You’re very welcome. Have a wonderful Christmas! -LE
I actually love Christmastime in San Francisco (especially the window displays in Union Square–I usually avoid the shopping area other times of the year, but it’s so fun then). Wish I could get up there more often…
Downtown SF is great during the holidays – I try and make it into The City at least once if I can. Sometimes just riding the ferry in from Marin to enjoy shopping at the Ferry Building and the booths scattered around the embarcadero can be a great holiday excursion…but I still dream of having a white Christmas! Happy holidays, Trix! – LE
Loved that excerpt!
At our house every year, we have Cookie Day. A whole Saturday devoted to making all of our holiday goodies, most of which aren’t actually cookies. This year it lasted 7 hours, and I was exhausted! But it’s still alot of fun. Plus then there’s all that sugar around the house to make you feel better. 😉
Thank you! I’m so glad you liked it. Cookie day sounds like a lot of fun! I think I should take the whole “Christmas in July” trend and run with it. I’m always slammed at this time of the year and I really miss the holiday traditions we had growing up. Have a wonderful Christmas! – LE
Love the description of his run-away brain – and the snowglobe
Thanks Ninna! The crazy story took over my life for two days and I think the frenetic pace of writing helped me with Kris. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas! – LE
Loved your Christmas cookie story – so important to hang onto those family traditions. Snow Globe sounds fun!