Cherry Almond Snowdrops

Karen's seventy-second birthday. She was born August 13, 1953, in Tacoma, Washington, the daughter of a hardware store owner and a schoolteacher, the woman who would grow up to adopt two Korean children and raise them in Bellevue and make tuna casserole on Tuesdays and apple pie on Thanksgiving and hold a granddaughter with shaking hands while singing "You Are My Sunshine." She is seventy-two. She has Parkinson's. She is alive and lipsticked and opinionated and still the most determined woman I know.

We celebrated on Saturday at the Wallingford house — the first birthday party in our new kitchen. I made a full Korean-American dinner: my doenjang jjigae (Karen's request — she asked for Korean food, specifically, for her birthday, which is a sentence I could not have imagined writing five years ago), James's scallion pancakes, David's roasted chicken (David cooks now; David's chicken is surprisingly good), and Karen's apple pie, which I made because Karen's hands could not roll the dough this year. She directed. I rolled. We made the pie together, the way we have always made things together: imperfectly, with love, with Karen's instructions and my hands.

Karen blew out candles. Hana helped — Hana's version of helping is blowing spit in the general direction of the candles and looking pleased when the flames go out. Karen laughed. Karen's laugh is slower now — it starts in her eyes and takes a beat to reach her mouth — but it is still Karen's laugh, still the laugh of the woman who found me funny at seven and exasperating at fourteen and extraordinary at thirty-two. She is the same Karen. The disease is subtracting but the Karen underneath the subtraction is the same Karen. I hold onto this. I hold onto this the way Hana holds the wooden spoon: with both hands, tightly, against the possibility of dropping it.

The recipe this week is Karen's apple pie — the version I made for her birthday, the version where I rolled the dough and she told me what to do. My hands, her instructions. The dough was imperfect. The crimping was adequate. The filling was sweet and tart. The pie was Karen's. It will always be Karen's, even when my hands make it, even when Karen's hands can no longer roll, even when. The even-when is coming. I can feel it. But the pie endures. The pie will endure.

Karen’s apple pie was the centerpiece, but a birthday table needs more than one thing to hold onto — and so I also made these Cherry Almond Snowdrops, a recipe I’ve returned to for every celebration that deserves something small and yielding alongside something grand. The cherry feels right for Karen: a little tart, a little sweet, a little jewel-bright. The powdered sugar coating is the part Hana got into immediately, which felt correct. We rolled them together, Hana and I, the same way Karen and I rolled the pie crust — imperfectly, with both hands, holding on.

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 15 min | Total Time: 35 min | Servings: 36 cookies

Ingredients

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup powdered sugar, plus 1 cup more for rolling
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup maraschino cherries, well-drained, patted very dry, and finely chopped
1/2 cup blanched almonds, finely chopped

Instructions

Preheat and prepare. Heat oven to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.
Cream butter and sugar. In a large bowl, beat softened butter and 1/2 cup powdered sugar together with a hand mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add almond extract and vanilla extract and beat to combine.
Add dry ingredients. Reduce mixer to low. Add flour and salt and mix until the dough just comes together — do not overmix. The dough will be soft but not sticky.
Fold in cherries and almonds. Using a spatula or wooden spoon, gently fold in the chopped cherries and almonds until evenly distributed throughout the dough.
Shape. Scoop dough by rounded teaspoonfuls and roll between your palms into smooth 1-inch balls. Place 1 1/2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets.
Bake. Bake 12 to 15 minutes, until cookies are set and just barely beginning to turn golden on the bottom. The tops should remain pale. Do not overbake.
First sugar roll. Place remaining 1 cup powdered sugar in a shallow bowl. While cookies are still warm (but cool enough to handle, about 3 minutes out of the oven), roll each one gently in the powdered sugar to coat.
Cool and re-roll. Transfer to a wire rack and cool completely, about 20 minutes. Once fully cooled, roll each cookie in powdered sugar a second time for a full, snowy coating. Serve at room temperature.

Nutrition (per serving)

Cherry Almond Snowdrops — Sweet and Small, the Way We Hold What We Love