Being a teacher, which I have loved, is a profoundly exhausting and all-consuming profession. Not that working in bio-tech was a picnic, of course, but I have never felt as fulfilled or exhausted as I have as a teacher. On weekends and holidays – or even just at the end of each teaching day – I’d just sort-of collapse and need to let my mind and body recover.

This didn’t leave much energy or time for the significant production that is the Ikeda Christmas Cookie scene. But in 2019 the school calendar happened to play out in a way that resulted in a rare two-week Christmas vacation, allowing me time to recover and then to bake like crazy. It was wonderful to get back to it, and to find the muscle-memory still intact, and to introduce a little bit of innovation.

I now own enough silicone pan liners that I’m using them all the time. Unlike “air bake” pans, I think the silicone liners manage to avoid delaying browning – mostly. They definitely avoid sticking and are simpler than parchment, but I wonder if parchment would have been preferable for the sugar cookies, in terms of browning. With 2021 hindsight, and now that I own a box of pre-cut parchment, maybe I’ll opt for that this year?

In an attempt to make the cookies as uniform as possible, I tried using my food scale to help, but the masses involved were too small and exceeded this scale’s ability to cope. So, I bought a lab scale that is specifically for smaller masses (no more than 200g) and I can’t wait to use it for the next Christmas Cookie production.

Anyway, this gallery gives you an idea of the production that is involved. The Viennese Crescents trace back to a 1955 New York Times article that my mother must have discovered. They are, by my taste, the best tasting of the Ikeda Christmas Cookies, and also the easiest to make.

The Wreaths are my next favorite to eat, and though they are very time-consuming to make, I love working with the eggy, delicate dough. I don’t know the provenance of that recipe, but I do vividly recall my mom explaining that the sugar needed to be fine green sugar and chunkier red sugar – so that the red sugar would look like holly berries on the wreaths. This is but one of many aspects of the compulsive Ikeda tendencies surrounding this affair.

The Candy Canes, which are a recipe that didn’t come from mom (!) are, without question, the most time-consuming to create. I love their look more than their flavor, but I know some who prefer this cookie over the others. I once spent two hours preparing a tray of these at some ungodly hour of the morning only to then go and burn them. I cried, went to bed, then kept going the next day.

The secret to the sugar cookies, which I learned from mom, is to roll them excruciatingly thin, and this is aided by dusting the rolling surface with flour mixed with sugar. This keeps the dough from getting bogged down (toughened) with too much flour. The compulsive need to put eyes on every cutout shape that should have eyes is entirely my own mental illness. Can’t blame mom for that one!

[A keen eye might notice that one of the photos shows what I was streaming on the iPad while I was baking… ]