Cookies : IN THE KITCHEN : Baking History

I didn’t go home for Christmas last year. Maybe I should have. Christmas was always my mother’s favorite holiday, but I had no way of knowing that last year’s would be her last. By the time I got home, the holidays were months past. She was in the hospital; the cookies were gone.

Some people have moms who are terrific cooks. They have memories of happy times shared in the kitchen preparing all kinds of delicious food. I am glad for them, but my mom was not a very good cook, and she spent no more time in the kitchen than was absolutely necessary.

She was smart, she was caring and she did her best raising four kids in situations that must have been trying. But cooking was not that important to her. I think she always regarded my passion for it with a kind of bemused amazement. Of course, if I had a husband and four hungry but pretty undiscriminating kids to feed every night, who’s to say I wouldn’t feel the same way?

The one time Mom’s routine really changed was Christmas. Here, she had two specialties: a sweet Norwegian candied fruit bread called julekake , and cookies--the rolled, stamped and decorated kind.

What I remember wasn’t just the cooking and baking but the holiday decorating whirlwind Mom threw herself into every year. Since we were a military family that moved around a lot, she took every Christmas as a challenge to reproduce for us the stable, small-town atmosphere in which she grew up.

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Out would come the oft-taped, tattered cardboard boxes full of decorations. The porcelain Santa and reindeer would go over whatever hearth came with our current quarters, the ornaments and lights would be hung, and the good German glass spire would go atop the tree, the candles would be placed in the brass angel chimes . . . and production would begin on julekake and cookies, which we would eat ourselves and share with any and all neighbors who might drop by.

To me, the cookies were probably the most fun. We kids would help roll and cut them and do the initial decorating--cinnamon candies for the reindeer’s noses and various colored sprinkles for lights on the Christmas trees. Then they’d bake and cool and the real artistry would begin. Sometimes we would have as many as a half-dozen cups of sugar icing, each dyed to a different improbable shade with artificial colors. Half the icing would go on the table, under the table, over the dog and into our mouths. The other half would wind up spread on the cookies.

By the end of the session, colored sugar crystals were a permanent part of the carpet and the kitchen would look as if some kind of sweet explosion had blasted colored icing and dirty dishes over every horizontal space available. We would be icing-smeared and giddy from the sugar. Mom would be red-faced and loudly vowing never to go through this again. But she always did. And when we were grown, there were grandchildren to take our places.

My own daughter is now 12 years old and getting pretty comfortable in the kitchen. She makes a mean quesadilla and helps out on everything from cutting up vegetables to roasting chicken. It pleases me that she wants to be involved when we have company (even though her most frequent request is “Can’t we please eat something normal ?”). I hope she grows up loving food as I do and knowing the pleasures of feeding friends.

But I can’t help but wonder, sometimes, whether any number of Mom’s and Dad’s dinner parties can teach those lessons nearly as well as one afternoon making Grandma’s Christmas cookies.

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These cookies are light and crisp--at least until you pile them with the optional icing. Every time I eat them I’m surprised at how good they taste, but that could be just remembrance. See for yourself.

GRANDMA SMITH’S CHRISTMAS COOKIES

2 cups sugar

1 cup butter

2 eggs

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

4 1/2 cups flour

Decorating candies

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Sugar Icing

Beat sugar and butter until light and creamy. Add eggs, 1 at time, continuing beating. Add baking powder, milk and vanilla. Beat well to mix. Add flour, 1 cup at time, beating after each addition.

Roll out dough 1/8 inch thick and cut into shapes with cookie cutters. Transfer to greased baking sheet; decorate with candies, if desired. Bake at 350 degrees 7 to 8 minutes, or until light brown on outside edges. Cool briefly, then transfer to rack. Decorate with Sugar Icing or decorations. Makes about 7 dozen cookies.

Each cookie, with icing, contains about:

77 calories; 38 mg sodium; 12 mg cholesterol; 3 grams fat; 12 grams carbohydrates; 1 gram protein; 0.02 gram fiber.

Sugar Icing

2 cups powdered sugar

1/4 cup milk

2 tablespoons butter, softened

Food colors

Combine sugar and 2 tablespoons milk in mixing bowl. Mix with fork. Continue adding milk, 1 tablespoon at time, until icing is thick enough to spread. Add butter and keep mixing until icing is smooth. Divide among bowls and color as desired. Makes about 2 cups icing.

Gingerbread plate and mug courtesy of Bristol Farms Cook ‘N’ Things in South Pasadena.