I love you through sparks and shining dragons, I do,
now there’s poetry, in an empty coke can.
I love you through sparks and shining dragons, I do,
now there’s majesty, in a burnt out caravan.

You got me off the paper round, just sprang out of the air,
the best things come from nowhere,
I love you, I don’t think you care.

I love you through sparks and shining dragons, I do,
and the symmetry in your northern grin
I love you through sparks and shining dragons, I do,
I can see myself in the refill litter bin.

You got me off the sofa, just sprang out of the air, the best things come from nowhere, I can’t believe you care.

–Made-Up Love Song #43 by The Guillemots

Christmas gets here too quickly, I’ve decided. In March, you can’t imagine making it to the end of the year and every month seems to dribble by. Then suddenly it’s the 24th of December and you’re frantically pacing around Westfield, wondering what to get Aunt Jan for Christmas.

For me, Christmas isn’t so much about the actual day itself, as the build up to the day. Christmas Day often takes place in a blur of excessive eating and gift unwrapping. But in the lead up to Christmas, the excitement gathers pace particularly in the kitchen as we bake off an assortment of treasures that I associate with Christmas : gingerbread, panforte, fruit cake and pain d’epice.

This year has been particularly busy for me at work, and now that things are almost slowing down a little, it feels as though a great weight as been lifted off my shoulders. Good bye to rising at 4 and 5 in the morning for work, though I must say it has been very character-building, in it’s own adorable little way. To celebrate having two days off in a row, I’ve been dancing around in the kitchen, listening to the Guillemots and Sufjan Stevens, decorating little gingerbread biscuits I made a few days ago. The inspiration came from a recipe for gingerbread men by Andrew McConnell in last week’s Good Weekend magazine. Instead of men, I made stars and snowflakes, and just for something a little bit unusual, the Sydney Harbour bridge. The bridge cutter was one I rescued from a bargain bin at Chefs Warehouse several months ago, but never found an excuse to use until now.

The biscuits are either slightly chewy if you roll them out thick, or more of a gingersnap, if rolled thinner. (I was a bit of a greedy child and when my sister and I used to make gingerbread, mine would often be slightly thinner; the logic being that I was actually yielding more biscuits. But these days I like my gingerbread to be on the thicker side so that it’s more bread and less biscuit). Below is the original recipe, which is meant to make 12 large gingerbread men, or more than enough small stars and snowflakes to fill the sky.

These gingerbread biscuits are my contribution to Francesca’s Waiting for Christmas event.

[Note: My smaller sized biscuits took less than the recommended baking time. Also if like me you like your spice, I would increase the spice content (and at least double the volume on your stereo speakers to get you in the mood!)].

Gingerbread Men :

200g butter
90g white sugar
90g soft brown sugar
1/4 cup molasses
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
4 whole cloves, pounded in the mortar
1 egg
550g plain flour
2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
pinch salt

Cream the butter and sugar together. Add the molasses, spices and egg and mix well.

Sieve together the flour, bicarb soda and salt, and add to the butter and egg mixture a bit at a time, stirring well after each addition.

Knead the dough a couple of times to make sure it is well mixed and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Then, on a floured bench, roll out the dough, in small batches, to about 3mm thick. If you are making large gingerbread men you may need to roll the dough out a bit thicker. Using a cookie cutter, cut out as many gingerbread men as your dough allows.

Place them on a tray lined with a sheet of baking paper. Bake in a preheated oven at 180’C for 12 minutes or until the edges are slightly browned. Cool on a wire rack, then ice as desired.

The biscuits will keep in an airtight container for up to a week.

Royal Icing :
(recipe from Rose’s Christmas Cookies, by Rose Levy Beranbaum)

3 large egg whites (90g)
460g pure icing sugar

In a large mixing bowl, place the egg whites and sugar and beat, preferably with the whisk beater, at low speed, until the sugar is moistened. Beat at high speed until very glossy and stiff peaks form when the beater is lifted (5 to 7 minutes). The tips of the peaks should curve slightly. If necessary, more icing sugar may be added. Keeps 3 days in an airtight container at room temperature. Rebeat lightly.

Simona from Bricole is hosting this week’s WHB, and it’s been warm enough today for me to be craving a big bowl of cold Soba noodles with spring onions. Spring onions, scallions or shallots. Even gibbons or cibies, if you’re Welsh or Scottish. By whatever other name you might know them as, they are still that member of the allum family that I love for that fresh, mild onion flavour, as a garnish in potato salads, scattered over steamed fish and white-cooked chicken, rolled up in peking duck pancakes and tossed through my favourite bastardised version of a cold soba noodle dish.

A favourite dish I have almost on a weekly basis is Soba noodles – both the plain buckwheat and green tea types – dressed cold in a soy based sauce, with plenty of aforementioned spring onions, black sesame seeds, thinly sliced cucumber, crispy deep fried eschallots and shredded chicken or poached salmon. It’s a refreshing bowlful of Summer that takes no time at all to prepare. Even better, you can make it ahead and keep it chilled (further allowing the noodles to soak up the flavours of the sauce) until you want to eat it. Just the ticket, when it’s a hot day and the last thing you want to be doing is standing behind a hot stove.

Nigella Lawson’s Soba Noodle recipe is a good place to start, when wanting to make this dish. I usually customise it according to my preferences, by including a dash of cooking sake and a bit of wasabi or chilli for added kick.

Soba Noodles with Sesame Seeds :
(Serves 4 as part of a meal; or 2 when eaten, gratifyingly, as they are.)

75g sesame seeds
salt
250g soba noodles
2 teaspoons rice vinegar
5 teaspoons soy sauce
2 teaspoons honey
2 teaspoons sesame oil
5 spring onions

Toast the sesame seeds in a dry pan over a high heat until they look golden brown, and tip them into a bowl.

Bring a large pan of water to the boil and add some salt. Put in the soba noodles and cook them for about 6 minutes (or according to packet instructions) until they are tender but not mushy. Have a bowl of iced water waiting to plunge them into after draining.

In the bowl you are going to serve them in, mix the vinegar, soy sauce, honey and oil. Then finely slice the spring onions and put them into the bowl with the cooled, drained noodles and mix together thoroughly before adding the sesame seeds and tossing again.

Leave the sesame seed noodles for about half an hour to let the flavours develop, although this is not absolutely necessary or sometimes even possible.

Last Christmas was all about mince tarts, but this year I’ve fallen in love all over again with that spicy, fruity and nutty Italian treat, panforte. Literally meaning “strong bread”, it is also known as Siena cake; named after that region of Italy where is it considered a speciality. The best panforte I’ve ever tried, was made by a chef I used to work with. He would make huge batches of it to be sold during Christmas, and I recall watching him struggle with stirring the honey syrup into the flour, spices, fruit and nuts. The trick with making panforte is to stir the ingredients together quickly while still warm before it starts to set too much – which can be problematic when making a large batch. He was straining so hard there was literally sweat pouring down his brow and it almost looked as though either the wooden spoon he was using, or his arm, would give at any moment. But the toil was not in vain, because once cooked and sliced, the rest of us would bicker over the delicious off-cuts. It was so tasty that if we needed to come to blows in order to get the biggest pieces, I’m sure I would’ve been the first to throw a punch.

The December theme for Sunita’s Think Spice event is cinnamon, one of my favourite spices, and also a spice which features in panforte.

Unlike most traditional panforte recipes, this one from Belinda Jeffery’s Mix & Bake is easier as it doesn’t involve taking the honey/sugar syrup up to a soft-ball stage. The end result is delicious, but is also slightly softer than the chewy panforte I’m used to. This could quite possibly have been due to my use of very soft, reconstituted-style dried figs, so don’t let that deter you from trying out this simple recipe.

Apart from cinnamon, my panforte also contained cardamom, black pepper, allspice, ginger, nutmeg, cocoa powder and an assortment of fruits (dried and glace) and toasted nuts, bound together by a pungent Tasmanian Leatherwood honey. The original recipe is as follows:

Barbara Lowery’s Pecan and Macadamia Panforte :
(recipe from Belinda Jeffery’s Mix & Bake)

edible rice paper or baking paper, for lining
75g plain flour
50g Dutch-processed cocoa, sifted
1 teaspoon each ground cardamom and cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground white or black pepper
200g dried figs, coarsely chopped
1 cup coarsely chopped glace fruits, such as apricots, pineapple and cherries
140g roasted pecans, coarsely chopped
75g roasted macadamias, coarsely chopped
160g whole blanched almonds
80g unsalted butter
110g castor sugar
180g honey
icing sugar, for dusting

Preheat your oven to 180’C. Butter a shallow 22cm round cake tin and line the base and sides with edible rice paper or baking paper.

In a large bowl, use a balloon whisk to thoroughly mix together the flour, cocoa, cardamom, cinnamon, nutmeg and pepper. Add the figs, glace fruit, pecans and macadamias and mix them thoroughly together.

Tip the almonds onto a baking tray and roast them for about 5 minutes or until they’re pale brown. Timing is important in the next step as the almonds need to be hot when you use them.

Meanwhile, put the butter, sugar and honey into a small saucepan over low-medium heat. Warm them gently, stirring until the sugar has dissolved, then stop stirring and bring the mixture just to the boil.

Immediately tip the hot roasted almonds and the hot syrup into the fruit and nut mixture. Quickly mix them together until they’re well combined. You need to be somewhat speedy here as the syrup and almonds must be hot so that everything mixes together easily; if they’re cool the mixture tends to harden and clump together.

Scrape the mixture into the prepared tin and use a palette knife or the back of a spoon to press down and flatten it out evenly.

Bake for 30 minutes; at this stage it will still appear somewhat soft when pressed (don’t worry – this is as it should be as it firms up considerably once it cools). Cool the panforte in the tin on a wire rack. Once it’s cool, turn the panforte out and remove any baking paper (the rice paper is edible and can stay put, just trim it if it sits up above the edge of the panforte).

If serving immediately, dust the panforte with icing sugar and cut as much as you want into narrow wedges. Tightly wrap any leftover panforte in plastic film and foil (or put it in an airtight container) and store it in the fridge, where it will keep for weeks.