Cookie Season
It starts somewhere between Halloween and Thanksgiving and often extending as far as Valentines Day. No matter your cultural or religious holidays, geographic origin, or self-identification, cookies are always a welcomed gift. On par with red envelopes, cookies are given to loved ones, extended family, friends, business associates, and casual acquaintances.
There are years I’ve baked a dozen different kinds of cookies and nestled them in colorful tins carefully separating each layer with wax paper. At other times (like this year), I struggle to get a single batch into the oven, usually in the lull between Christmas and New Year. Last year I didn’t bake any.
This year was headed in the same direction thanks to the surging infection rates of the pandemic. The holiday baking spirit eluded me until a recipe for Chewy Ginger Spice Cookies with Ras El Hanout caught my attention. In my cupboard was a folded piece of paper stained gold from the spices inside that were hand-carried from Morocco. The paper was also inside two sealed baggies to stifle the aroma from taking over everything in my kitchen (although that would not be a bad thing) and to keep fresh.
As a small ruminant farmer I am always trying to learn which customs go with which country and culture. There are nuances between who eats goat and who eats lamb. Holidays differ, but customs are amazingly similar across borders when it comes to food. The pungent herbs and spices always present, only in different quantities and combinations.
It was the scent from across the miles as well as the centuries that caused my heart to grow three sizes kicking my want for butter, sugar, and flour into high gear. Our sense of smell is often described as primitive because it connects to older, subconscious portions of the brain responsible for emotions and memories.
I had never heard of ras el hanout until several years ago when a customer at market handed me a page torn out of British GQ with a recipe for lamb tagine and asked if I’d cook it. I had all the ingredients except one, including a ceramic tagine that had been given to me by one of my first goat customers—a Moroccan chef. Missing, of course, was the most important ingredient, the spices. A quick text to him about my shortcoming only piqued my interest more. “I make my own. It’s like curry or BBQ rub, everyone has their own recipe.”
A little digging on the internet and soon I was pulling jars and tins out of the cupboards in an effort to gather as many ingredients as possible. One of the herbs was lavender so I dissected a sachet I’d made to go in a clothes drawer out of flowers from my own garden knowing it was safe to eat. Later I would learn about how certain spices are toasted prior to grinding to deepen flavors. But that first batch was a labor of determination as I gave my mortar and pestle a workout for what amounted to only a few tablespoons of flavor-packed powder which all went into that one lamb and spiced prune tagine.
That page is tucked away in the folder of meals I want to cook again but avoided doing so because of not wanted to go through making my own ras el hanout again. But then one of my former fellow vendors showed up at market a few months ago and shared she was heading to Morocco for work. We had worked market for years weathering all sorts of Sundays together from rude customers to exceptionally well-dressed patrons. I had missed our weekly chats before and after market now that they’d moved on to a federal job. “Do you want anything from Morocco?” and I jumped at the opportunity to procure the genuine goods.
A few weeks later she returned with the golden stained envelope in two plastic baggies warning me of its strength. “I was there when the merchant mixed and ground it. It has dozens of ingredients.” What an amazing market that must be.
The real deal. I dusted off the tagine and again made the GQ recipe. The flavors were similar yet different, kind of like eating at the homes of my Indian and Pakistani friends where each has their own family blend of curry.
There was still quite a bit of the spice blend leftover so I shared some and even threw a few pinches in my Thanksgiving dressing to flummox the family. It wasn’t the butter and sage they were used to. I put the envelope in the baggies into an additional glass jar in hops of preserving its pungency for another meal.
I was in a holiday funk, not wanting to be a part of super-spreader gatherings including a cookie exchange party I politely declined yet seethed with envy as events appeared on social media. As I scrolled along up popped an algorithm-induced posts for holiday cookie ideas, including one with ras el hanout. All the feelings of socially distanced loneliness gave way to the years a laughter and hugs, the joy of trying to make the best of a current situation and just one of the many friendships built on the foundation of the farmers market. I felt like the Grinch riding the sleigh to Whoville.
Out came the Kitchen Aid, sticks of butter, bags of sugar, the jar of unsulfured molasses I use more for bottle babies and less in baking, a few fresh eggs still warm from the coop, and finally, I opened the jar of spices releasing a wave of gratitude carried in the scent of cumin, cinnamon, coriander, cardamon, clove, nutmeg, pepper, and so much more. Digging a little deeper in the cupboards I also managed to find a few jars of festive decorative sugar.
I might have missed the parties, but what a joy it was to fill the house with the smell of baking cookies and share the bounty of my efforts with those around me during the holiday season.