December 23 -National Pfeffernusse Day

Happy Pfeffernusse Day!

Today we celebrate the German Christmas cookie, the pfeffernusse. It is said that this cookie originated to celebrate Saint Nicholas Day on December 5th and is used throughout the holiday season in Germany and throughout the world.

You can find a recipe for the traditional pfeffernusse cookie HERE.

And for 25 Days of Cookies, visit my friend Jennifer’s site. She has prepared and shared 25 different Christmas cookies on her CHRISTMAS COOKIE BLOG this year.

A new Christmas cookie story with a gingerbread twist is

A Cookie for Santa written by Stephanie Shaw and illustrated by Bruno Robert (2014)

You can read the full discussion HERE.

Two other stories about gingerbread cookies are written by Jan Brett.

Gingerbread Baby written and illustrated by Jan Brett (1999)

In this story, the gingerbread boy was not cooked long enough and when Matti opens the oven early to take a peek a gingerbread baby escapes. Matti and his mother try to catch the gingerbread baby, but he escapes out the front door and runs away from them, the tabby cat, and the dog. Matti runs back into the house and looks inside the old worn cookbook while the gingerbread baby runs across the farm, past the goats and the twins Martha and Madeline. Meanwhile, Matti is mixing and baking in the kitchen. The gingerbread baby continues to run down the road past a pig in a cart, and into the village past the crowd of people on the bridge. The gingerbread baby jumps off the bridge onto a floating piece of ice to the shore where a hungry fox was waiting for him. The gingerbread baby escaped the jaws of the fox by hiding in a milk cart until the milkman heard him giggling. Then he had to jump down and run away again. Luckily for him, he found the perfect hiding place… a little gingerbread house sitting in the snow. The gingerbread baby ran inside and closed the door. Soon Matti’s parents came home, worn out from running, and sad that they could not catch the gingerbread baby. Weren’t they surprised to see that Matti had made a beautiful gingerbread house! And only Matti could hear the tiny voice of the gingerbread baby coming from inside the house.

Gingerbread Friends written and illustrated by Jan Brett (2008)

The gingerbread baby is happy living in the gingerbread house Matti made for him, but something is missing. The gingerbread baby is lonely. So one day, he slipped out and went to the village to find a friend. In the village, the gingerbread baby found a man and a woman just his size in the bakery window standing on top of a cake. But when he went in to talk to them, they just stared straight ahead with their eyes wide open. Then he spied a little sugar cookie girl, but she didn’t look at him either. The gingerbread baby tried to make friends with seven white swans swimming on a sea of frosting, but they ignored him also. Finally, he ran into a tiny doorway and fell asleep. But he awoke to find a mouse nibbling on his marshmallow pom-pom and decided it was time to go home. He ran out with the mouse, the cat, the baker and his wife chasing him. He kept running as a rooster and red fox joined in the chase. He got home just in time to find that Matti had made him a whole batch of gingerbread friends!