Holiday traditions

[Mi1229]

As long as I can remember my family has been baking Christmas Crinkles.  MMMMM.  I can smell thesweet warm aroma of the different spices all blending together in the crisp winter air: Cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and molasses.  They were crispy on the outside chewy and moist on the inside.  The cookies melted with an explosion of flavor.  It was a special secret recipe passed down from mother to daughter for generations. Somewhere along the line the exact recipe had gotten lost.  The women in my family hadbeen endlessly trying to recreate that one special recipe: more molasses, no less cloves, butter not Crisco...trying that is until a couple of Christmases ago my grandmother found the illusive cooking diary of Mama Grande, the last woman to have taken the covetedrecipe to her grave(may she rest in peace).  As my grandmother opened the book it was as if a heavenly light shown down upon the pages.  There it was the beautiful list of ingredients and the procedure that told what and how much to mix together.  I was delighted to find out that in all my trial and error I had discovered the exact recipe.

 Now that I have a beautiful new daughter, I will be able to share this cherished tradition with her.