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Edible Art: Springerle Cookies for Christmas
| Article
# : |
21228 |
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Section : |
LIFE
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| Issue
Date : |
12 / 2001 |
2,449 Words |
| Author
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Sharon Hudgins
Sharon Hudgins is an author and journalist who lived for
fifteen years in Germany. Her ancestors emigrated from Prussia
to the United States in the 1860s. |
When I was twelve, a favorite cousin gave me an unusual Christmas gift: a small wooden rolling pin with flower and animal designs carved into it. She included a recipe for making German Springerle cookies, their tops embossed with the designs on the rolling pin. Back in the 1950s, I was surely the only person in our small north Texas town who owned such an exotic baking utensil!
I could hardly wait to make a batch with my new rolling pin, but the results were disappointing. Although the little white cookies were pretty, they were so hard and dry that it was almost impossible to bite into them. And the taste couldn't compare with the more flavorful German cookies that my mother always baked at Christmastime.
So my Springerle rolling pin became merely a decoration, displayed on the shelves of my many kitchens over the years. Only after I moved to Germany did I learn to make Springerle correctly--and to fully appreciate the texture and flavor, as well as the history and symbolism, of these cookies, which are such an important part of German Christmas traditions.
Historical roots
Springerle are white, anise-flavored cookies, made from a simple egg-flour-sugar dough. Usually rectangular or circular in shape, they have a picture or design stamped on the top. The images are imprinted with specially carved rolling pins or flat molds (Springerle presses, or boards). After the cookies are baked, the designs are sometimes enhanced with edible food colors--or with tempera or acrylic paints, if the cookies are to be used as decorations.
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