There are things that you just do without really questioning them: brushing your teeth, putting one foot in front of the other when you go for a walk, baking biscuits during Advent. The arguments in favour of the first two points are probably obvious, because who wants to stumble or have rotten teeth? We can take a closer look at point three. Of course, we are not doing this entirely altruistically, as we want to make your mouth water and whet your appetite for a winter holiday with us at the Alte Mühle in Sand in Taufers. When you finish reading this text, Junior Manager Sarah's favorite biscuit recipe will be waiting for you as a sweet surprise. But don't cheat and scroll right down, I promise?
Why do we bake cookies during Advent?
Biscuits in the monestary
Medieval monastery biscuits would probably not have appealed to modern sweet tooths. No wonder: there was hardly any sugar or butter in them. But all kinds of spices such as cardamom, cinnamon and vanilla were mixed into the dough back then. Historians - and those inside - pretty much agree that the origins of today's Christmas biscuits can be found in the medieval monasteries of Europe. And it went like this: Advent was a time of fasting back then and the diet was correspondingly simple-minded. In addition, the nuns were looking for an elegant (and of course pious) way to take some money out of the rich people's pockets. So they came up with the idea of packing the spices from the East that were in vogue at the time into dough and selling them to the wealthy as sinfully expensive flavour bombs that conformed to Lent. It took a century or two, but of course even the less well-off got wind of this delicious pastry. And since the 16th century, biscuit dough has also been rolled in middle-class kitchens.
Nostalgia for snacking
With the first industrially produced biscuit cutters and, at the latest, the triumph of the electric oven, one type of biscuit or another is baked wherever Christmas is celebrated around the world. For many people, Vanillekipferln, Spitzbuben, Lebkuchen and the like symbolize Advent, a kind of time machine for biting into. Some guard their biscuit recipes like a treasure trove, bake more than 50 varieties per season or turn kneading dough and icing sugar together into a communal experience. If, like us hosts, you don't have much time for family in the run-up to Christmas, an afternoon together in the bakery is a real luxury. And so Sepp, Beatrice and Sarah have already marked this day in their diaries: Sarah's favorite biscuits will be made the Wednesday after next: chocolate crispy biscuits. And because, like all South Tyroleans, we're nice people, we're sharing the recipe with you here:
Chokky Rocks (for 3 baking trays):
250 g butter
180 g sugar
1 sachet vanilla sugar ... beat with a mixer until fluffy.
2 eggs ... add and continue mixing
1/2 pkg baking powder
350 g flour 5-6 cups cornflakes
100 g chopped chocolate
125 g sultanas (if you like them) ...add and fold in briefly.
Then form small balls and bake at 180 degrees Celsius for 15-20 minutes.
