Happy, merry mandelbrot making this holiday season
If you celebrate Christmas, you may tend to think of Hanukkah in terms of the Christian holiday. You expect it to occur right around Dec. 25, which makes it convenient when it comes to shopping and gift giving for Jewish friends or family members.
But this year, those of us who are not Jewish may find that Hanukkah which begins at sundown Wednesday, Dec. 1 has sneaked up on us. Of course, it is right there where it has always been beginning on the 25th day of Kislev and concluding on the second day of Tevet on the Jewish calendar. It celebrates, as it always has, the rededication of the temple that was destroyed by the Syrians and reclaimed by the Maccabees, and the miracle of the one day's worth of oil that lasted for eight days while the temple was rebuilt. But, relative to Christmas, it's “early.” Which leaves some of us scrambling when it comes to Hanukkah gifts.
Enter the mandelbrot. Mandelbrot literally “almond bread” are easy-to-make but elegant cookies that can see you through the festival of lights right into the Christmas season. Because they have no butter or milk, mandelbrot are “pareve” or “neutral” according to kosher dietary laws, which means they can be eaten with meals containing meat or those containing dairy. Because they are twice-baked, they are reminiscent of biscotti. Joan Nathan, in her remarkable “Jewish Cooking in America” (1994 Knopf), speculates that the large population of Jews in the Piedmont region of Italy may have introduced almond biscotti to Eastern Europe, where the cookies became mandelbrot.
At any rate, these gems can make a welcome appearance on any holiday cookie plate. The recipe here comes from “The Gourmet Cookie Book” (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010), which features the single best cookie recipe from each year of the late lamented magazine's existence, from 1941 to 2009. Mandelbrot were chosen to represent the year 1968. Forty-two years later, the recipe still holds up, as do those for Gianduia brownies (1998), mocha toffee bars (1987), Cajun macaroons (1941) and dozens of others. In fact, if you are looking for a holiday gift for anyone on your list, “The Gourmet Cookie Book” would fit the bill. Include it with a tin of your homemade mandelbrot.
Like biscotti, mandelbrot are sturdy and keep well, which makes them easy to mail. That means that if you start baking now, you can speed packages of these crisp, almond-flavored treats to your loved ones in time for the holiday, whether that holiday starts Dec. 1 or Dec. 25.