Ode2Fatty

Scottish Shortbread and Christmas Crackers

Today my dear dear friend and workmate brought me a batch of her shortbread. She usually bakes batches for the holidays, and I had already been grilling her about whether she'd be making them this year as these cookies are 2nd on my list of Best Cookies In the World (only Mrs. Fields's white chocolate macademia nut cookie tops it). Anyway, this shortbread is not your average, hard, textureless, bland-tasting packaged shortbread that you buy in the store. The main reason is that my friend is Scottish-born (Brora, Scotland to be exact), and this is her mom's TOP SECRET recipe. Usually she is so sweet and gentle, but I thought she was going to smack me when I told her I wanted to post the recipe here - she has absolutely forbidden me to post it on my blog. Sorry. These shortbread cookies are dense, chewy and the right amount of sweet and you can tell they're made with only good basic quality ingredients (there's only 3 ingredients). Anyway, my buddy made me 2 batches - one with regular flour and one with whole wheat flour (she's studying holistic healing and is offering a "healthier" alternative this year.) Turns out the whole wheat batch was sweeter, but the regular batch had a better texture (the whole wheat was not as dense and felt grainier). I will have eaten both batches BY MYSELF by the end of the day (maybe before lunch).

I also asked my friend about these Christmas Crackers I saw with the Walkers shortbread items in the Aussie section of the international grocery store in Singapore. There are a lot of Aussie goods at the store, and my friend said there are a lot of Scots in Australia. So these Christmas Crackers are like a toilet paper roll (or any short cardboard tube, I guess) which is wrapped in festive paper and tied at the ends to make 2 bows. Inside the bow is a (i) gunpowder strip, (ii) Christmas hat (a crown made of colorful paper), (iii) small gift (set of jacks, bouncy ball or, if you really like the persons, diamond earrings), and (iv) fortune or joke. So, get a hold of one of these Christmas Crackers, find a friend, each of you pull on the bows at the end (there'll be a bit of a bang from the gunpowder) and whoever gets the tube, gets the goodies! These are usually done at Christmas dinner and might be something new add to your own family tradition!
ADDENDUM: As of 2:15 p.m., I have finished ALL of the shortbread.

posted by Fatty @ 8:42 AM