December 22, 2017

Readers share their favorite Christmas memories

Family’s Springerles cookies became gifts to others during annual season of giving

Virginia McBride

Growing up in Jeffersonville during the 1920’s, making the German anise cookies, Springerles, was a Christmastime ritual at our house.

Each year, my Mother borrowed some beautiful molds for this cookie from a German neighbor. I can still see my Mother in the breakfast nook amid the ingredients, stirring and beating, pressing the molds, and cutting these cookies.  These were the days prior to electric mixers.

My sister and I would carry these cookies to fill the top of the dining table.  The table was covered with a bed sheet, as the cookies needed to dry overnight.

The next morning, Mother was up around 5 o’clock and began baking the many dozens of Springerles. They would become our gift to others, and everyone loved receiving my Mother’s cookies.

At one point, my Mother asked my Father if he could replicate the wooden molds in metal in the foundry where he worked. He did, but they were so heavy.   The funny part was that we forgot to tell our neighbor, and she wondered why we no longer borrowed her molds.
 

(Virginia McBride is a member of St. Anthony of Padua Parish in Clarksville.) †

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