Traditional German-Swiss holiday cookie, made with wooden or metal molds that are pressed into the dough to form cookie shapes. After years of experience, we have learned that the flat metal molds work best – the rolling pins are best hung on the wall as decorations. It’s impossible to make a batch of these without having some of the cookies fracture – the puffy tops are fragile. Don’t worry – the broken ones belong to the cook.

• 4 cups powdered sugar
• 4 eggs
• ¼ teaspoon anise oil
• ½ teaspoon vanilla
• 2 tablespoons butter
• Grated rind of 1 lemon
• 3 ½ cups flour
• 2 tablespoons baking powder*

Beat sugar and eggs in mixer for 30 minutes at medium speed. Add anise oil, vanilla, butter, lemon, and about half of the flour. Beat well. Add the rest of the flour and baking powder; beat well. Roll into sheets ¼-inch thick on well-floured surface. Press springerle mold into dough, and cut around shapes. Leave shapes out to dry overnight. Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Bake at 250 degrees for 20 minutes, but do not brown.

from Mom’s great-aunt Lula Lacaff

*After we posted this, we heard from some of our cousins whose copies of this recipe say 2 teaspoons, not 2 tablespoons. Carla checked through several cookbooks, and the weight of the evidence leans toward the smaller amount. That said, this is how we have made springerle for years, and they’ve always turned out deliciously.