Star of Christmas

My baking sheets have seen a lot of action these past six weeks, very likely as much as in the previous 10 and a half months.  I've reacquainted myself with the location of most of my cooking apparatus, with the exception of the still long-lost coffee grinder.

Like cinnamon, allspice, and cloves, the flavor of licorice is inextricably tied to Christmas for me. This is the time of year my mother indulged her love of licorice allsorts, an affection I believe she shared with her father and passed along to me.  I'm not a fan of bags of licorice, knowing that I'll be the only one consuming it.  Oh, I can do it ... but its better if I don't.

In conversation with Cécile the other day, I mentioned that I'd like to try my hand at making some sort of licorice cookies since cookies had kinda been 'my thing' this year.  She had some fresh star of anise that she dug out of her spice drawer ... and so, here we are.

The recipe for Star of Anise cookies comes from The Messy Witchen and I think I have to agree with her when she says "yummy."  They actually looked so good that I didn't mind making the ground star of anise or caster sugar.  What I did mind was that the recipe was in metric grams that I needed to convert to Canadian cups.  The kitchen scale that normally sees use for diet measures - and otherwise sits forgotten in a dark cupboard recess - came in very handy today.

The end result?  These cookies were worth the extra fuss.  I dyed them blue and added the white sprinkles for a snowball effect.  Blue food may look strange, but it's delicious.  I can't wait to share them with my friends.

It's Christmas Eve .. that means we're about to sit down to the annual showing of Alastair Sim in "A Christmas Carol."

Have a great festive meal everyone!