Why do humans celebrate big events with sweets? Their scarcity in the past no doubt elevated them to this special status, and Christmas time is one of the biggest events of the year. Holiday sweets are ladened with spices and nuts and honey, all items that were at the tippy tippy top of ye olde food pyramid in days of yore. At least this is how I currently view them, and justify their inclusion in our diet = special sweets for special times. Life is, after all, too short not to enjoy delicious things. Wishing you and yours a lovely holiday season from across the water on Lopez - happy new year too!
I agree with your analysis, especially your mention of spices and nuts and honey, all scarcities in times past. We valued things more when they were harder to find. Now, sometimes, we work to limit our access to things in order to make them more delightful once we have them. I remember--hopefully accurately--a scene from the Laura Ingalls Wilder books in which the girls each get an orange for Christmas. Oh blessed day! Now I have a counter full of oranges, with which to make citrusy cranberry sauce and an olive oil orange cake and perhaps add fresh citrus to cocktails as well. How decadent.
Dry fasting was a remarkable experience in part because it returned me--us--to a state of rapture over the smallest thing. First, while still fasting, over the smell of coffee beans, of nutmeg, of chili. Then, as we emerged from the fasting, cool water on the tongue. Watermelon. Nothing ever tasted better. Now, weeks later, my taste buds want the richness of "Mexican" fudge, having forgotten the season of want.
Wishing you a lovely holiday season as well from our beautiful island home!
My mother, oldest of ten kids on a poor West Virginia farm, told us about getting an orange for Christmas. And it was special since at no other time were oranges had. We were learning about scarcity and abundance, and even more importantly, about gratitude. Thanks for your writing - sometimes I learn, sometimes I remember.
For garnish: fresh pomegranate seeds, more dried fruits, more nuts
- Rinse wheat berries twice. In a medium saucepan, combine berries with 4 cups of water, and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Lower to simmer, cover and cook for ~ 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Turn off heat. Let stand for 6 hours.
- Uncover, bring to boil, stir in spices, dried fruits, and brown sugar. Lower to simmer and cook uncovered for ~ 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Serve the burbara in bowls, topped with garnish.
To serve later, store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. It will keep 3 to 4 days. Eat cold or warm ! To reheat, add a small amount of water to your serving, stir, and heat in the microwave. Add garnish after the burbara has been reheated.
Fascinating - I also had never heard of this dish. For those who are cooking gluten-free, I wonder if oats might work. Or even, for a New World twist, quinoa (although that would leave everything identifiable in the original, whereas wheat berries, or perhaps oats, would meld and melt the ingredients and flavors together more).
That looks delicious and easy to convert to maple or honey. I moved to the desert and am finding that middle eastern plants grow best here like grapes and apricots so I love seeing recipes like this.
Those look delicious. I have revamped recipes to use maple sugar as cane sugar doesn't agree with me and I rarely eat it. My favorite Christmas food was always the home made fudge that would be included on Christmas treat plates neighbors would bring us.
This is traditional maple fudge. I don't add vanilla to either recipe as I don't want to compete with the maple flavor. Be aware that candy temperatures change with altitude and google the conversion as even at my 2,000 feet above sea level I am affected. My first disaster was when I lived at 5,000 feet and did not know to convert the temperature.
As search engines are not what they used to be, it took me about an hour to finally find a maple chocolate fudge recipe made the old way and without any cane sugar in it. I last searched for this and made it a couple years ago and it is delicious beyond imagination. As it is expensive to make, one cannot overdo. This time I will print it out to save.
Yum - that looks delicious. And I agree that using alternative sugars has that additional utility of being expensive enough that one has to be more sparing. Even organic cane sugar is so cheap these days, it doesn't feel special at all. And despite what I have heard some thoughtful people argue, I do not think that all simple non-fruit carbs are processed by the body in the same way. Cane or beet sugar are not the same as coconut or date sugar, and maple syrup and honey are best of all. I, too, find maple sugar a lovely ingredient, one that allows a one-to-one replacement in recipes, without having to account for the liquidity of maple syrup.
Christmas is about the food even for me. No more of my mother's Christmas cookies even though poor substitutes exist for most of them. I always preferred ham to turkey. I was behind a lady in line to check out at the grocery store the other day. I must have looked like a Chuck Jones cartoon character as I ogled the steaks she was buying. The holidays always meant two weeks at the grandparents' place stalking the riverswamp. Miss those times almost as much as I miss the youth that went with them.
things were SO DIFFERENT when we were kids, right Kelly? we used to get 'dressed up', go to Mass as a family. my grandmother received a Christmas corsage & pinned it to her 'dressy' wool coat. my sister and I were going nuts over the TWO gifts (total) we each got.
now my sister 'goes to Mass' online, in her PJ's, even today for Christmas. my peers spends well over $100 on each of their grandchildren (so times that by 3 or 4 if you add what parents and other set of grandparents give!!) Kids are allowed to eat junk all day and then take a pass on the expensive meat served for dinner. or worse yet, given separate 'kid' food (usually also junkie stuff). nobody would dream of a separate meal for kids, back in our day! I've never done that with my own kids; I find it insane.
(we're having ham today, with the bone in, so my mom can make soup next week. for New Year's, my older son is bring a prime rib roast. Yay meat!)
We did not finish Antipode, not yet. Thank you for inquiring after it! I think it is not to many people's taste, but I do need to go back into book-writing mode for some weeks soon, and will resume publishing the chapters then. Still to come: a tree fall that almost flattens Bret.
As I’m drinking kombucha, trying to detox from yesterday’s Christmas feast with relatives… I’m DELIGHTED to find your post about Holiday sweets! Oh my goodness, the Brown Sugar Ginger Crisps sound WONDERFUL and I will be trying them shortly! Thank you, Heather. I subscribe this time last year, and have been enjoying your substack. In July 2023, I took my tween-age nieces on a road trip up from SoCal to Salem, OR, and we listened to your (and Bret W’s) book, The Hunter-Gather’s Guide to the Twenty First Century as we meandered. It was delightful, simple but not simplistic (as I think that Einstein would have complimented) and sensibly made distinction of the impractical word salad that has accumulated over the past twenty years. The mutual knowledge, knowing we know that your sensibilities coincide with their young minds was affirming, and gave up catalyst and anchor to pin our conversation.
Thank you for the lovely compliments! I am delighted that tweenagers (not a word?) enjoyed Hunter-Gatherer's Guide.
And yes, the brown sugar ginger crisps are a cryptic bombshell of a cookie. They look like nothing. They taste spectacular. And also, unlike any other cookie I've ever had (but like stew), they are actually better on day two (and days three and four, if they last that long), as the ginger flavor becomes both more pronounced and rich.
I think the Ginger crisps will be a future holiday favorite! I love the idea that they improve with age. I first learned of the"Tweens" term in Tokien's The Hobbit, and found it to be very useful. We learn so such in our twenties. I think your book should be standard reading for everyone, esp that age group. It might save them, and the rest of us, a lot of strife, expodentially! Many thanks!!
Recipes! awesome. thanks Heather! those look amazing and the ginger ones are something I will love to make sometime in the future.
I often joke to friends/family that baking is 'my therapy' and I have been baking and giving away baked goods for Christmas, for going on 40 yrs now. I like to 'riff' on traditional recipes for cookies, adding different dried fruits & nuts, etc. and enjoy making biscotti, as they are a little different than the typical holiday treat (and less sweet, in general). I also sometimes make and give away a Port Wine & Cheddar spread, for those who don't like sweets at all. the traditional pastries that my Greek in-laws usually have are also less sweet and usually contain honey as the sweetener, and loads of walnuts, sometimes figs.
Greek sweets with honey and walnuts and figs do, too.
As for biscotti-like treats, I enjoyed making mandelbrot as a teenager. It's the same exact idea, I believe, just culturally Jewish rather than Italian. I love the little (and not so little) innovations in baked goods. For biscotti and mandelbrot, the innovation is in forming the dough into a flat loaf, baking it for a while, then slicing it and baking the slices. Playing with heat and edges, surface areas and volumes--baking is explicitly chemistry, much more so than much of cooking, but it is also, of course, an art.
yes, that's exactly how I make biscotti. its that second baking that makes them crispy.
I've never heard of mandelbrot. I will have to look that up. many cultures probably make a version of something made specifically to 'dip' into a beverage.
for sure baking is chemistry but it is 'art' for me. more chemistry in the use of yeast (which I am not at all good at)
I know those recipes are all tasty, but recent events have me on an exclusionary diet. The fudge is close to being included if I could ever find a good substitute for milk, or evaporated milk in this case. Dairy free milks don’t work for me either. In any casein, Happy Holidays.
I wonder if it might work with coconut milk? You would want a good thick coconut milk, not the thin stuff they sell as (fake) creamer. Not sure it would work, but maybe.
I have seen evaporated goat milk. wonder if that would work? its still milk from a mammal though... fudge is tricky; it doesn't take much for it to 'fail'. I have had many failures. we have successfully made pumpkin pie with alt 'milks'.
Merry Christmas! Sharing with you all a podcast episode from one of my favorite biblical scholars, Dr Michael Heiser. I have a feeling some of you will enjoy his teaching style and content.
This one is timely (and involves astronomy!), its called "What day was Jesus born?"
If you want to up your game with the fudge, next time make your own mini-marshmallows. The process allows shaping and cutting as desired. It eliminates that “little burning whang” of commercial marshmallows.
I've never understood marshmallows as a phenomenon to eat on their own, although you are not the first person to suggest that the problem is that I haven't had real (honest, homemade) marshmallows.
Around campfires as a youth, I was one of the people who burned my (giant toxic commercial) marshmallows to a blackened crisp before sandwiching it between Hershey's chocolate and graham crackers.
In the Mexican fudge, the marshmallows get fully melted and incorporated into the fudge, leaving no visible trace and acting more as...sugary glue, I guess?...than as a decipherable ingredient, so I think using least-toxic-available-in-a-food-co-op marshmallows is a decent compromise.
We don’t keep marshmallows as a rule, just with seasonal things like the fantasy fudge, which suggests marshmallow cream. A relative made marshmallows and, not to be outdone, I copied him. They are noticeably more pleasant, but still, sugar is sugar, so, not a habit.
Why do humans celebrate big events with sweets? Their scarcity in the past no doubt elevated them to this special status, and Christmas time is one of the biggest events of the year. Holiday sweets are ladened with spices and nuts and honey, all items that were at the tippy tippy top of ye olde food pyramid in days of yore. At least this is how I currently view them, and justify their inclusion in our diet = special sweets for special times. Life is, after all, too short not to enjoy delicious things. Wishing you and yours a lovely holiday season from across the water on Lopez - happy new year too!
I agree with your analysis, especially your mention of spices and nuts and honey, all scarcities in times past. We valued things more when they were harder to find. Now, sometimes, we work to limit our access to things in order to make them more delightful once we have them. I remember--hopefully accurately--a scene from the Laura Ingalls Wilder books in which the girls each get an orange for Christmas. Oh blessed day! Now I have a counter full of oranges, with which to make citrusy cranberry sauce and an olive oil orange cake and perhaps add fresh citrus to cocktails as well. How decadent.
Dry fasting was a remarkable experience in part because it returned me--us--to a state of rapture over the smallest thing. First, while still fasting, over the smell of coffee beans, of nutmeg, of chili. Then, as we emerged from the fasting, cool water on the tongue. Watermelon. Nothing ever tasted better. Now, weeks later, my taste buds want the richness of "Mexican" fudge, having forgotten the season of want.
Wishing you a lovely holiday season as well from our beautiful island home!
My mother, oldest of ten kids on a poor West Virginia farm, told us about getting an orange for Christmas. And it was special since at no other time were oranges had. We were learning about scarcity and abundance, and even more importantly, about gratitude. Thanks for your writing - sometimes I learn, sometimes I remember.
"Sometimes I learn, sometimes I remember." What a gift those words are. Thank you.
My dad grew up wealthy in upstate NY and still only had oranges at Christmas as a treat. Transport was much more difficult back then.
as a child of the 60's, oranges and whole walnuts still in the shell were a staple for Christmas stockings.
Offering us recipes for the holiday season is a lovely idea. Thank you.
I read recently that Middle Eastern Christians serve 'Burbara' as part of their Christmas meal.
I made some yesterday - delicious !
BURBURA (Wheat Berry Pudding)
adapted from themediterraneandish.com
1 cup wheat berries
1 tsp ground cinnamon
4 tbsp brown sugar
1 tsp anise seeds
½ tsp fennel seeds
½ cup chopped dried apricots
½ cup raisins or dried cherries
For garnish: fresh pomegranate seeds, more dried fruits, more nuts
- Rinse wheat berries twice. In a medium saucepan, combine berries with 4 cups of water, and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Lower to simmer, cover and cook for ~ 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Turn off heat. Let stand for 6 hours.
- Uncover, bring to boil, stir in spices, dried fruits, and brown sugar. Lower to simmer and cook uncovered for ~ 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Serve the burbara in bowls, topped with garnish.
To serve later, store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. It will keep 3 to 4 days. Eat cold or warm ! To reheat, add a small amount of water to your serving, stir, and heat in the microwave. Add garnish after the burbara has been reheated.
Fascinating - I also had never heard of this dish. For those who are cooking gluten-free, I wonder if oats might work. Or even, for a New World twist, quinoa (although that would leave everything identifiable in the original, whereas wheat berries, or perhaps oats, would meld and melt the ingredients and flavors together more).
That looks delicious and easy to convert to maple or honey. I moved to the desert and am finding that middle eastern plants grow best here like grapes and apricots so I love seeing recipes like this.
oooooh, I would totally eat that! thanks for the share!
Interesting, never heard of this.
Those look delicious. I have revamped recipes to use maple sugar as cane sugar doesn't agree with me and I rarely eat it. My favorite Christmas food was always the home made fudge that would be included on Christmas treat plates neighbors would bring us.
This is traditional maple fudge. I don't add vanilla to either recipe as I don't want to compete with the maple flavor. Be aware that candy temperatures change with altitude and google the conversion as even at my 2,000 feet above sea level I am affected. My first disaster was when I lived at 5,000 feet and did not know to convert the temperature.
https://ambryacres.com/maple-fudge-recipe/
As search engines are not what they used to be, it took me about an hour to finally find a maple chocolate fudge recipe made the old way and without any cane sugar in it. I last searched for this and made it a couple years ago and it is delicious beyond imagination. As it is expensive to make, one cannot overdo. This time I will print it out to save.
https://www.stannardfarm.com/blogs/news/chocolate-maple-fudge-1
Yum - that looks delicious. And I agree that using alternative sugars has that additional utility of being expensive enough that one has to be more sparing. Even organic cane sugar is so cheap these days, it doesn't feel special at all. And despite what I have heard some thoughtful people argue, I do not think that all simple non-fruit carbs are processed by the body in the same way. Cane or beet sugar are not the same as coconut or date sugar, and maple syrup and honey are best of all. I, too, find maple sugar a lovely ingredient, one that allows a one-to-one replacement in recipes, without having to account for the liquidity of maple syrup.
Christmas is about the food even for me. No more of my mother's Christmas cookies even though poor substitutes exist for most of them. I always preferred ham to turkey. I was behind a lady in line to check out at the grocery store the other day. I must have looked like a Chuck Jones cartoon character as I ogled the steaks she was buying. The holidays always meant two weeks at the grandparents' place stalking the riverswamp. Miss those times almost as much as I miss the youth that went with them.
things were SO DIFFERENT when we were kids, right Kelly? we used to get 'dressed up', go to Mass as a family. my grandmother received a Christmas corsage & pinned it to her 'dressy' wool coat. my sister and I were going nuts over the TWO gifts (total) we each got.
now my sister 'goes to Mass' online, in her PJ's, even today for Christmas. my peers spends well over $100 on each of their grandchildren (so times that by 3 or 4 if you add what parents and other set of grandparents give!!) Kids are allowed to eat junk all day and then take a pass on the expensive meat served for dinner. or worse yet, given separate 'kid' food (usually also junkie stuff). nobody would dream of a separate meal for kids, back in our day! I've never done that with my own kids; I find it insane.
(we're having ham today, with the bone in, so my mom can make soup next week. for New Year's, my older son is bring a prime rib roast. Yay meat!)
Does your tree-topper ask "Who are YOU?"
Merry Christmas!
ps - did we finish reading your book?
More frogs!
I would like more of the Madagascar adventures too!
Sometimes, yes!
We did not finish Antipode, not yet. Thank you for inquiring after it! I think it is not to many people's taste, but I do need to go back into book-writing mode for some weeks soon, and will resume publishing the chapters then. Still to come: a tree fall that almost flattens Bret.
As I’m drinking kombucha, trying to detox from yesterday’s Christmas feast with relatives… I’m DELIGHTED to find your post about Holiday sweets! Oh my goodness, the Brown Sugar Ginger Crisps sound WONDERFUL and I will be trying them shortly! Thank you, Heather. I subscribe this time last year, and have been enjoying your substack. In July 2023, I took my tween-age nieces on a road trip up from SoCal to Salem, OR, and we listened to your (and Bret W’s) book, The Hunter-Gather’s Guide to the Twenty First Century as we meandered. It was delightful, simple but not simplistic (as I think that Einstein would have complimented) and sensibly made distinction of the impractical word salad that has accumulated over the past twenty years. The mutual knowledge, knowing we know that your sensibilities coincide with their young minds was affirming, and gave up catalyst and anchor to pin our conversation.
Thank you for the lovely compliments! I am delighted that tweenagers (not a word?) enjoyed Hunter-Gatherer's Guide.
And yes, the brown sugar ginger crisps are a cryptic bombshell of a cookie. They look like nothing. They taste spectacular. And also, unlike any other cookie I've ever had (but like stew), they are actually better on day two (and days three and four, if they last that long), as the ginger flavor becomes both more pronounced and rich.
I think the Ginger crisps will be a future holiday favorite! I love the idea that they improve with age. I first learned of the"Tweens" term in Tokien's The Hobbit, and found it to be very useful. We learn so such in our twenties. I think your book should be standard reading for everyone, esp that age group. It might save them, and the rest of us, a lot of strife, expodentially! Many thanks!!
Recipes! awesome. thanks Heather! those look amazing and the ginger ones are something I will love to make sometime in the future.
I often joke to friends/family that baking is 'my therapy' and I have been baking and giving away baked goods for Christmas, for going on 40 yrs now. I like to 'riff' on traditional recipes for cookies, adding different dried fruits & nuts, etc. and enjoy making biscotti, as they are a little different than the typical holiday treat (and less sweet, in general). I also sometimes make and give away a Port Wine & Cheddar spread, for those who don't like sweets at all. the traditional pastries that my Greek in-laws usually have are also less sweet and usually contain honey as the sweetener, and loads of walnuts, sometimes figs.
Port wine & cheddar spread sounds scrumptious.
Greek sweets with honey and walnuts and figs do, too.
As for biscotti-like treats, I enjoyed making mandelbrot as a teenager. It's the same exact idea, I believe, just culturally Jewish rather than Italian. I love the little (and not so little) innovations in baked goods. For biscotti and mandelbrot, the innovation is in forming the dough into a flat loaf, baking it for a while, then slicing it and baking the slices. Playing with heat and edges, surface areas and volumes--baking is explicitly chemistry, much more so than much of cooking, but it is also, of course, an art.
yes, that's exactly how I make biscotti. its that second baking that makes them crispy.
I've never heard of mandelbrot. I will have to look that up. many cultures probably make a version of something made specifically to 'dip' into a beverage.
for sure baking is chemistry but it is 'art' for me. more chemistry in the use of yeast (which I am not at all good at)
I make several biscotti varieties as well. My special treat to myself, I suppose.
nice. what's your favorite? mine is a mocha/almond with espresso glaze. :)
And lemon. I love lemon. Unglazed.
Maple/almond with an almond flaze.
I know those recipes are all tasty, but recent events have me on an exclusionary diet. The fudge is close to being included if I could ever find a good substitute for milk, or evaporated milk in this case. Dairy free milks don’t work for me either. In any casein, Happy Holidays.
I wonder if it might work with coconut milk? You would want a good thick coconut milk, not the thin stuff they sell as (fake) creamer. Not sure it would work, but maybe.
I have seen evaporated goat milk. wonder if that would work? its still milk from a mammal though... fudge is tricky; it doesn't take much for it to 'fail'. I have had many failures. we have successfully made pumpkin pie with alt 'milks'.
My mom was an avid reader of Gourmet magazine ... as was I... thanks for the memories...
by the way... here in Israel jelly donuts (now all flavours) are our holiday sweet treat...
Have a very Merry Christmas/Happy Hanukkah with your family...
This one's a keeper. Thank you!
Merry Christmas! Sharing with you all a podcast episode from one of my favorite biblical scholars, Dr Michael Heiser. I have a feeling some of you will enjoy his teaching style and content.
This one is timely (and involves astronomy!), its called "What day was Jesus born?"
https://nakedbiblepodcast.com/podcast/naked-bible-138-what-day-was-jesus-born/
Thank you for sharing such a personal memory. It is always seems special to share memories of our families traditions amongst friends.
If you want to up your game with the fudge, next time make your own mini-marshmallows. The process allows shaping and cutting as desired. It eliminates that “little burning whang” of commercial marshmallows.
I've never understood marshmallows as a phenomenon to eat on their own, although you are not the first person to suggest that the problem is that I haven't had real (honest, homemade) marshmallows.
Around campfires as a youth, I was one of the people who burned my (giant toxic commercial) marshmallows to a blackened crisp before sandwiching it between Hershey's chocolate and graham crackers.
In the Mexican fudge, the marshmallows get fully melted and incorporated into the fudge, leaving no visible trace and acting more as...sugary glue, I guess?...than as a decipherable ingredient, so I think using least-toxic-available-in-a-food-co-op marshmallows is a decent compromise.
We don’t keep marshmallows as a rule, just with seasonal things like the fantasy fudge, which suggests marshmallow cream. A relative made marshmallows and, not to be outdone, I copied him. They are noticeably more pleasant, but still, sugar is sugar, so, not a habit.
Probably gives some softness.