On Saturday, December 3 I spent the day baking shortbreads with my sister-in-law Evelyn. I had a huge project ahead of me as I intended to make dozens more than last year. In lieu of Christmas cards, I’m giving out my mother’s famous shortbreads. I got up early and started punching them out using her old but indestructible cookie gun. At first I tried making a batch with gluten-free flour for a colleague of mine. I found this flour made the cookies taste very dry. Yet when I added more butter to the mix on my fifth baking day this past Thursday, December 8, the cookies lost their shape while in the oven. By the time I post this I have already made thirty tins, with each tin holding around 44 cookies. That’s 1320 cookies! I may not be done yet… This weekend I announced that I was finished but my cookie list keeps getting longer. I might have to make another eight tins this Saturday. It’s fun while I do it on my own, as I have time to listen to Christmas CD’s and change discs. However when Evelyn and I worked on the cookies, it was more like an assembly line of production. We punched out one cookie sheet after another, sprinkling coloured sugar or putting candied cherries on the tops. We listened to Christmas music on the nonstop fireplace channel.
