POST HOLIDAY RECAP NO. 1: Of Bread and Cookies and Presents Under the Tree

Happy Chrismukkwanewyear Everyone! I hope you were all merry and bright and as festive or non festive as you wanted to be. And I hope you ate a ton and called your relatives and watched cheesey movies and wore your new pajamas ALL DAY LONG because dammit what ELSE are these 10 days at the end of December for if not excessive pj wearing?

If you have been subject to my Facebook photo onslaught for the last week then 1) I'm sorry. I get overly excited sometimes. 2) obviously you are aware of the fact that BREAD happened and also PIPARKAKUT happened and also, duh, CHRISTMAS* happened.

*Christmas in our house meaning "celebration of winter and pickled herring and snow and world peace." We keep it classy and nondenominational. 

Things I got for Christmas:

• Books. So many books. So many beautiful beautiful books. I am ripping through them as we speak. Should be done by Valentine's Day. Wheeee . . . . 
• Socks. So many socks. Of the running and hiking and slipper variety. I am totally with Albus Dumbledore in the always needing more socks department. 
• Running gear! New, sweet smelling running gear that as of right now is blissfully free of dirt and/or blood and/or Ebola. 
• Did I need five more pairs of fleece leggings?
• "Need" is such a fluid concept, I always think.
• A candle holder shaped like a sheep. 
• Going back to the top bullet, a wooden bookmark into which has been branded the big dipper constellation. It's currently smack dab in the middle of a truly epic faerie war trilogy set in a steampunk Victorian Edinburgh with flying machines and secret passages and suuuuper swoony men.
• Addendum: said book has just been finished. Delivered in all respects. Lots of kissing, discussion of mechanics, and a glorious cliffhanger ending hinting at a veritable chasm of unlocked secrets. Yay. 

FYI Mum got basically the same thing, except she got TARDIS leggings instead of fleece ones, and a sweater vest with raccoons on it, and instead of steampunk faerie books she got yet ANOTHER history of Bletchley Park. (NB: That is not a judgmental comment. I myself received two more histories of the Plantagenets and the Wars of the Roses and a second copy of a genealogical chart of the Kings and Queens of Britain from Egbert to Elizabeth. Glass houses, is all I'm saying.)

Ok ok ok on to the photos and cooking!

So last year for my LL's I went slightly insane and did TINS full of MANY DIFFERENT KINDS OF BAKED GOODS. This year I went slightly insane in a different way and did BREAD. MANY DIFFERENT KINDS OF BREAD.

CHRISTMAS LOAVES FOR THE LL'S

---

Finnish Rye

Cornmeal French

Oatmeal Honey

10 Grain

Amaranth Aniseed

Teff Molasses

These are all yeasted breads, FYI, and all made with the basic yeast bread recipe of two packets of yeast dissolved in 400ml of hot water, and four cups of flour. You can vary the flour type depending on what you want, and add anything like oats or 10-grain cereal or caraway or aniseed, which I did here. You can also sweeten it by adding honey or molasses or make it richer by adding milk or melted butter. That's why it's so fun making bread, there's SO much room for experimentation. And as long as you have someone as willing to be a guinea pig as my sainted mother, you're all set. 

I made two of each kind, and then obsessively packaged them (see below) with obsessively stamped labels, then obsessively packaged the packages in a bigger package (see below) and delivered them, like an obsessive elf, to the LL's. 

Crazy? Yes. More fun for me than it was for them? Possibly. Awesome? TOTALLY.

ooh PS also I made SAFFRON BREAD for Lucia even though it was a few days after the 13th. Saffron Bread on the 19th is still better than no Saffron Bread at all, I feel. As always I used Beatrice's recipe (is there any other). This year I did a big loaf rather than billions of S-shaped buns. Easier for toasting for breakfast, according to Mum, who had no problem with the change of shape.

Below is the amount of saffron that goes into a GINORMOUS LOAF OF BREAD and yet manages to infuse the entire thing with that awesome earthy-sweet-yet-pungent smell. I do kind of wish saffron wasn't $928379283 a strand. I would totally use it more often.

OK OK OK COOKIES.

So these cookies are PIPARKAKUT which is Finnish for GINGER COOKIES which is Finnish for TOTALLY DELICIOUS AND FESTIVE. Again, this is Beatrice's recipe (she really comes into her own at Christmas, our Beatrice) and again, there really isn't any other for proper Ginger Cookies. These are spicy and sharp and crunchy. None of this candy-ass chewy, pallid, monstrosity nonsense. These are the real thing.

Go Piparkakut or go home.

It's traditional to make these on Christmas eve, and also traditional (for medieval farmstead reasons I will not go into) to make them in the shape of pigs. We do definitely do the pig thing, but you can do ALL pigs because that would be boring, so we break out the stars and people and reindeer and trees and also the Joulupukki (goat . . . another medieval/pagan thing that . . . oh . . . here if you really want to know.)

Mum was a trooper and taste-tested before we left them out for Father Christmas. She approved, so we gave him some milk and a napkin and went to bed and waited for morning. I am happy to report that he ate them.

On Christmas Day I made a preposterous amount of white icing and we decorated them in a VERY VERY life-insurance-commercial kind of way with matching ruffled aprons and carols in the background and it was all very Hallmark and nauseous. Luckily, we soon pulled back from the edge by mercilessly mocking the other's decorating abilities, swearing, arguing, and generally behaving like we usually do.

I would like to take this moment to point out that all (and I mean ALL) of the broken cookie extremities that you see in any of these photographs are entirely of Mum's doing. The two below, in particular, resemble not so much photos of cookies as photos of a crime scene.

Mum.

Mum.

Beetle. 

Luckily, they taste just as festive and delicious.

Up next in the post department is BOXING DAY enjoyed with my aunt and uncle, sprouts (yes, SPROUTS) a pie of the savoury variety, and rice pudding made with $239847932 worth of vanilla beans.

But now, if you'll excuse me, there is a huge cat waiting to fall asleep on my lap, and another book to be chosen from the ever-diminishing pile in my bedroom.

Happy Holidays, dear reader!
Beetle xxx