No one left behind: A Christmas Feast, not a NATO mission
Christmas is a time for breaking bread, clinking glasses, and filling the room with that glorious symphony of voices rising in laughter and good-natured debate. It’s a time when the heart grows larger, the table stretches longer, and chairs are pulled in for anyone who wanders by.
There’s a magic to Christmas that isn’t found in the gifts under the tree or the glittering lights outside. It’s in the clatter of mismatched plates, the warmth of a roaring fire, and the way a kitchen becomes the beating heart of a house, spilling over with smells of roasting meats, spiced puddings, and pies made from recipes that span generations. It’s in the stories we tell—half-true, exaggerated, or just plain ridiculous.
And let’s be clear, any proper Christmas gathering starts with cookies – specifically, shortbread. Not those sad, dry store-bought ones that crumble into disappointment, but the real deal. My mom’s recipe, passed down with care and reverence, is simple perfection. Simple, rich, and unapologetically buttery, shortbread is the ultimate Christmas handshake—welcoming, warm, and impossible to resist. You don’t mess with shortbread. No icing, no sprinkles, no nonsense. Just flour, sugar, butter, and a touch of salt working in perfect harmony. You offer someone a piece of shortbread, and in that one act, you’ve said, “You’re welcome here. Pull up a chair.”
In a world so often fractured by distance, misunderstanding, and just plain busyness, Christmas demands we put the nonsense aside. It insists we look up from our screens and extend a hand, a glass, a plate. It’s not about perfection. The turkey might be a little dry; the gravy, too salty. But none of it matters when the house is alive with noise and the kind of joy that comes from being part of something bigger than yourself.
And if there’s one rule to live by during Christmas—or any time, really—it’s this: leave no one alone. Not the cranky old guy who sits at the end of the bar nursing his pint of bitter. Not the neighbor who just moved in and whose name you still can’t quite remember. Not the cashier who wishes you a polite “Merry Christmas” or or our now woke PC “Happy Holidays” but looks like they haven’t heard it said back to them all season.
This time of year is about more than friends and family. It’s about strangers who, even for one meal, stop being strangers. Who become, for a few hours, part of the sprawling, imperfect mess of your world. It’s the kid who shows up with their college roommate in tow. It’s the widow down the road who thought she’d eat alone this year. It’s the regular at the pub who’s there every single Christmas because there’s no one waiting for them at home.
Make extra food. Pour another drink. Bake more shortbread. Open your door wider than you think it can go. Invite chaos. Welcome the unplanned. Because the truth is, the more people there are, the better everything tastes. And when the night grows late, and the candles burn low, you’ll find it wasn’t about the gifts or the food or even the booze. It was about them. All of them. The people who turned your Christmas into a kind of messy, beautiful miracle.
So this year, don’t leave anyone behind. Start with a batch of shortbread – trust me, they’ll come running. If you’ve got a table, you’ve got a family. And that’s all you really need. And maybe, just maybe, a plate of the best damn shortbread you can make.
Mom’s Christmas Shortbread
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter creamed
- 1/2 cup icing sugar
- 1/2 cup cornstarch
- 1 cup flour
- pinch salt
- sugar for sprinkling optional
Instructions
- At low speed, cream butter and add rest of ingredients.
- Chill 30 minutes.
- Drop by tsp on ungreased cookie sheet or roll 1″ balls and stamp with fork to 1/2″ thick. OR roll out and press into cookies using a simple cookie cutter.
- Bake 325 degrees F for 15-20 minutes.
