Until last week I didn't have a Christmas tree in my house. The old shoe boxes with ornaments were still in the garage and there were no stockings hanging on the fireplace. The gifts were still unwrapped. I take care of my mother, who will be 89 two days after Christmas, and after a few days with her in the hospital, I got COVID. I still have fatigue, headaches and joint pain.
Although I didn't lose my taste. Even without the decorations, two weeks ago I made 400 cookies, and a week ago I started making 42 sherry cream pies that people ask me about every year. To me, baked goods, given as gifts to someone, are the best part of the holidays.
According to many people, at the beginning of December we are supposed to have a hundred things done, or else existential panic invades us. But what I remember from childhood has nothing to do with rushing. We decorated our tree with the first ornaments my mother bought when she came to the United States in the 1950s: fine bells and glass balls, red and green. We use tinsel to make magic. And on the Formica counter, near the pink wall oven, my mother taught me how to bake.
When I was 8 years old, I could make all the varieties of cookies that we laid out on plates for neighbors, teachers, the mailman, and our relatives. Certain recipe cards only came out at Christmas: Russian tea cakes, brownie drops, Scottish shortbread cookies with maraschino cherry centers, oatmeal with apricot filling.
Everyone's favorite were the roll-up cookies made with cream cheese and orange zest, cut into camels, stars, bells, trees and angels. I carefully dropped the glaze flavored with almond extract and red or green food coloring with my little fingers. My mother was demanding. The cookies had to be perfect. They sat on paper plates on the counter, a treasure not to be touched.
But we, five brothers, made our own cookies with the ends of the dough, and each of us got to choose one for that day.
A little over a week ago I made 100 squares of traditional shortbread cookies, sprinkled with red and green sugar. I drove to Riverside Elks Lodge 643 and, along with four other women, prepared containers of homemade cookies and treats for the homeless veterans. An hour later, I walked to Riverside First United Methodist Church, where our nativity play was performed on the lawn. Seven of us were behind long tables with hundreds of cookies for later. This is my tribe: women who bake from scratch, from recipes or from memory, who prepare dishes, visit and laugh with each other.
But sherry cream pie is my singular and famous offering. My mother taught me how to do it when I was 10 years old. I think she found the recipe in a First Ladies of California recipe book. I think this was Nancy Reagan's entry. It's as 1970s as you can imagine, with nothing natural except eggs. I use California sherry from the Central Valley and the tapas are baked with a golden touch.
I make these breads for all the people who help my family survive. My neighbor Nancy took care of me during COVID with beef broth and cough drops. Louie, who for 20 years has trapped opossums, raccoons and skunks when one needs to be relocated from my yard. Mark and Cathy, who do our taxes, even when we are late and confused. The doctors and medical technicians who take good care of my mom, the UPS, Amazon and Fed Ex drivers who visit me even when I don't receive packages, the mailman, the garbage collectors, the landscapers: cakes for everyone.
Every year, my three favorite Christmas moments have to do with this cake. A few days before Christmas I'm in a warehouse with Dave and Phil, decorating a red 1950 Farmall tractor with Christmas lights. Dave and I ride it through the nighttime streets, while I wave like a Riverside parade queen in front of the Mission Inn. Phil will break his hot pie with his fingers and we'll have a whiskey.
The next day, I'll deliver four large pies to Bob's Auto, where George and his brother, nephew, and fellow mechanics always get the best: They take care of five vehicles for my family, whether my daughters are driving from Oakland or Pasadena. After 20 years, George is like family.
I married the first man I made sherry cream pie for. Now my ex still gets a cake every year when our three daughters are here. This year we are all together with husbands and partners, except JP, who is working in the oil fields of Texas, whose cake we mailed. Last year, my ex brought my favorite gift: a baby chainsaw from the Rubidoux Drive-In swap meet. Yellow and black, the perfect size for me, the home baker, the woman who climbs the old mulberry tree and drops long leafless branches while he sits on the porch, playing Earth, Wind and Fire on his phone, his cake wrapped in aluminum foil. waiting to be opened.
My mother has not contracted COVID; She is indomitable, except for her severe memory loss. She doesn't remember that she has the keys in her arm, but she said to me while she was gathering the baking ingredients: “Did you add almond flavor to the frosting?” Did you get the orange from your tree for flavor? Did you put enough nutmeg in the cake? She remembers the Formica countertop in the kitchen and so do I.
Susan Straight's latest books are “Mecca” and “In the Land of Women.” She lives in Riverside.
