All I want for Christmas.....

  

All I want for Christmas is one last ingredient.... What??? I hear you all ask? Well let me explain, in our family we have a tradition, we bake a certain cookie every year, as a matter of a fact Christmas cannot go by with out these particular cookies.... I think there would be riots and strikes in our family were the cookie jars not filled with them on the 16th of December each year..... My grandmother Nanny, baked them , my mother and Aunt baked them, alas my Aunt has gone off to her family in another part of the country( how rude).... And as you all know my mother(insert sad face here) passed away this year  and so it has fallen on my shoulder to make them.....

 

They are called Soetcookies, no one quiet knows how come these yummy spicy little cookies are our particular choice of Christmas cookie but they just are...... We all love them! A lot!

  

   

Soetcookies

  

So promptly and dutifully on the 16th of December, I got out the recipe book and got started, I did everything by the book exactly as my mother had written it down, they smelt great and looked good......  

 

But Houston, I had a problem...

 

At round about the same time my brother called me, he had decided to make the Soetcookies too but had also hit a problem, the exact same problem.... the dough was crumbly, and you could not roll it out, at all......

 

Crumbly....

 

My sister and I pondered this dilemma over a cup of coffee and decided that we would add milk bit by bit until the consistency was good to roll..... it worked.... Thankfully as riots and strikes over Christmas would just not do!

 

That's Better....

  

So I am sure that by now  you want the recipe....

 

 Our Family's Soetcookies

 

4 pounds Flour

2 pounds Brown Sugar

1 pound Butter

3 Eggs

2 tsp of Bicarb in Milk

1/2 Cup of Brandy

2tsp Cinnamon

2tsp Mixed Spice

1 tsp Cloves

2 tsp Ginger

salt to taste

 

Cream the Butter and sugar

Add the rest of the ingredients

Roll out and cut out Christmas shapes

Decorate with nuts and cherries(the traditional thing, I decided on Christmassy M&M's)

Bake for 10 to 15 min at 170 degrees Celsius

 

And as always..... Apply to mouth.....

 

M & M's

Baked

 
They WORKED thank Heavens.... And are SUPER  YUMMY! Cindy and I  have had more long conversations about the recipe, and have decided that we need to use a half a cup of milk to dissolve the Bicarb and we also doubled up on the spices.... to make them more spicy of course....
   

A Heap of Yumminess

 

And so Mommy, if there is anyway for you to let me know..... All I want for Christmas is that missing ingredient..... Please ... If you could......Oh and STOP laughing at us! xxx

   

A Beautiful Rose

PS : 1 pound is equal to 500g according to one of  my recipe book