Haske family keeps warm tradition alive with cookie baking and exchanging
The Christmas cookies were arranged neatly on three tables pushed together on any available space at Corny and Ann Haske?s home, a farmhouse between Metz and Hawks. If there were open spots on the table they were probably created by the family cookie thief, Olivia, 2. Olivia, when an opportunity presented itself, would snatch a cookie and run into the living room. She could be found just outside the doorway of the kitchen area with a cookie and one bite missing, looking sorry that she took the sugary treat, but enjoying it all the same.
IT WAS easy for the cookie monster to get lost in the commotion with more than 15 of the Haskes? children and grandchildren running around.
And the Haske cookie factory is quite an operation. Some family members wash pans, while others decorate cookies with toppings or fill them with different flavored jellies.
While some Christmas traditions are as much a part of Christmas as Santa Claus and Bing Crosby songs, the Haske Christmas cookie exchange is a relatively new tradition, having been started seven years ago. And it looks as if it could last for many years to come.
IT WAS a cold, winter-like day Saturday outside, but members of the Haske family were oblivious of the conditions with three ovens going at one time, and so much to do in preparing and cooking 100 dozen cookies. That?s a lot of butter, flour and sugar. There were many other ingredients as well, including marshmallows, coconut, nuts, and peanut butter.
Not all of the ?official? names of the cookies were known, but called simply peanut balls, pecan tarts, or two-layer cookies.
There may be much fancier names in Bon Appetit magazine or the 1965 Betty Crocker cookbook, but it?s easier to remember ?cowboy cookies.?
?I THINK IT?S wonderful,? said Ann Haske, minutes after family members sang ?Jingle Bells,? accompanied by Corny on the accordion.
?I get to sample so many different cookies and I get to be with my grandchildren.?
The grandchildren have their own tradition as they make a gingerbread house each year. It took about two hours to put together. Standing about eight inches tall, the luscious structure was trimmed in frosting with a cookie-shaped Grinch standing guard outside. Only the youngest members of the family can work on it each year.
IT?S A smoothly-coordinated endeavor, but the Haske crew has to eat, and one can?t live on cookies during the eight hours it takes to bake all the cookies.
Each year a menu is drawn up by the family hosting the cookie operation so everyone can bring a dish.
This year family members had baked French toast and oven omelets for breakfast. Lun
AND FOR those who were not able to participate, such as Marti and Christine Tabor in Lansing, Ray and Rokita of Lansing and Eric Fleming, stationed in South Dakota, they will feel as if they were part of the cookie-making process when they open their packages that were sent to them in the mail..
For the Haske clan, it?s not all about the cookies, omelets or Christmas songs. They could be making birdhouses and be just as happy, as long as they were able to be together for the day.
by Peter Jakey, Managing Editor
