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#32 Kourambiedes (Greek Butter Cookies) 1974

"I have to say..." Susan paused with her hand stuck in grasp position as she gazed down at my most recent offering at knitting group. "They look a lot like breasts."

The rest of us stared at the sugar-dusted mounds with a whole clove in the center of each one. Sure enough.

Recalling my August 22 rant about crumbly, fragile cookies, here is a case in point. Although the editors call them "tender" and "buttery," the less flowery term is "fall-apart."

Maybe I don't know how to eat a "delicate" cookie delicately. These make either a mess or a hazard. If you bite in, the crumbs go down your shirt. If you pop the whole thing in the mouth at once, the crumbs stick to every moist surface. Don't breathe in, whatever you do. The crumbs could choke you!

What makes this cookie too much to bear, though, is the whole clove that is placed in the center of each one. The recipe says to remove it before eating the cookie!

I really felt stupid telling friends to remove the clove from the ridiculously delicate cookie before eating it. Some in mid-bite. Some I forgot to tell. Oops. Having trusted me until now, they figured what the hell, everyone eats baked cloves, right?

Have you ever eaten a whole clove? Well, it's not as dramatic as you might expect. A little crunch, a little intense flavor, a little numbness of the tongue wherever you bit down. No lasting scars. But a good cookie experience it does not make.

The recipe is here. A recipe made with ground cloves and proportionately more almonds is here.

Comments

  1. Hello, I stumbled upon your blog due to the link you put to mine via the recipe. I have to say, I love this post, especially the way you start. When I took these cookies with me to a party, the same thing was said about them: that they look like breasts.

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