Polvorones and Mantecados
The traditional Christmas biscuits from Almería
The traditional Christmas biscuits from Almería
“It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas”, Perry Como once sang. And later Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra and Michael Bublé and almost every other singer too 🙂 .
So I suppose the time has come to bake some typical Christmas pastries.
Since we live in sunny Andalusia rather than cold, dark and rainy Northern Europe, we don’t prepare gingerbread or Christmas pudding or mince pies. Our typical Christmas cookies are a little different, but almost as sweet and heavy. Only really good eaters can manage more than two of them.
A polvorón is a rather rich, soft and extremely crumbly schmaltzy biscuit. They are traditionally made of pork fat, flour, sugar, milk, almonds and/or other nuts. Its term polvorón derives from the Spanish polvo (powder or dust). If not handled gently, the pastry already falls to pieces in your hand and not in your mouth.
Mantecados are a variation of polvorón. The main difference is that they do not contain almonds or other nuts. They also tend to be round in shape, whereas polvorones are typically more elongated to oval in shape. And unlike polvorones, mantecados are not covered with icing sugar, but are often covered with sesame seeds.
Nowadays, they also offer polvorones covered in chocolate. This at least prevents them from crumbling in your hand. Instead, you then mess up everything with chocolate … there is always something 🙂 . Mantecados are often flavoured with some spices. Lemon zest, cinnamon, aniseed and cocoa are the most popular.
… the original
Traditionally, the polvorones are dusted with icing sugar after they have been allowed to cool.
If you like it a little more chocolaty, you can instead cover them with very dark chocolate …
… the variation
You can let your creativity shine and add some spices to the dough …
Add cinnamon and cardamom for an even more Christmassy twist,
Add a little orange zest and ginger for a more spicy touch,
… or add some cocoa powder for the chocolate lover.
Whatever you choose, they’ll be the best Christmas biscuits you’ll find in Almería!
Merry christmas! Enjoy the andalsian way of christmas bakery …