Molasses Cookies

by Janet Kaderli

As she and her grandmother make traditional Christmas cookies, Erica learns about her relatives who came to live in Texas in the mid-1800s and she begins to feel more comfortable in her new home

64 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1998

Reviews

[Manybooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

I do wish I could give a five star rating for the combination of Janet Kaderli's text and Patricia Arnold's illustrations for their 1998 chapter book Molasses Cookies. For indeed and generally speaking, Molasses Cookies tells a totally sweet and tenderly uplifting, optimistic story, and I do really enjoy how Kaderli without textual dramatics and sans negativity and trauma describes how Erica Kraft moving with her parents from Michigan to Texas (which for the parents actually means returning home to family but for Erica indicates leaving all of her friends and everything familiar behind for Texas and for family she hardly knows) is mirrored and reflected in the stories Omie (Grandma) tells of Erica's ancestors migrating from Germany to Texas in the mid 1800s, how these accounts and Omie telling her granddaughter of German customs and traditions that have been retained in New Braunfels, Texas enter into Erica's heart, make her feel both comfortable in her new home (in Texas, with her family, her grandmother, her uncles, aunts, cousins) and also connected to and proud of her German roots. And just to point out that I am also rather pleased there is no mention by Janet Kaderli of WWII in Molasses Cookies. Because since Erica Kraft's ancestors immigrated to Texas from what is now Germany in the 19th century, in the 1830s and 1840s (and thus basically a century before WWII), it in my opinion does not really make sense to textually feature and include Naziism and the Holocaust in Molasses Cookies, and yes, that Kaderli's historical introduction, the dual language English/German recipe for molasses cookies and the short bibliography certainly are appreciated added bonuses for me (and equally move Molasses Cookies from a simple and tenderly told household relocation and family tale to a book that also provides solidly researched and presented German American or rather more specifically German Texan history).

Combined with the fact that Patricia Arnold's black and white accompanying artwork are an aesthetically delightful visual accompaniment to what Janet Kaderli verbally shows, what is narrationally being presented in Molasses Cookies, with Arnold's pictures reflecting the text but never becoming overwhelming, never illustratively pushing Kaderli's story down or to the sidelines, my reading experience for Molasses Cookies (and which I found on Open Library) has most definitely been for the most part unexpectedly heartwarming and smiles of appreciation inducing (and as such also highly, also warmly recommended). But unfortunately, and as already alluded to above, although I do rather want to rate Molasses Cookies with five stars, there are two main bones of textual contention I have noticed regarding Janet Kaderli's words that make me (even though a bit grudgingly) lower my rating from five to four stars.

For one, considering that many (if not in fact the majority) of Germans arriving in Texas in the 19th century considered themselves to be Social Democrats, supported the Union, emancipation and were as such equally staunchly pro Abraham Lincoln and which of course caused many problems and also much danger for German settlers and homesteaders when Texas seceded and became part of the Confederacy, well, I do wish that Kaderli would mention this in her otherwise excellent introduction for Molasses Cookies (and I also hope that this is just an inadvertent oversight and has not been deliberately ignored by Nancy Kaderli due to questions of so-called political correctness). And for two, but importantly in my opinion, although the information Janet Kaderli shares regarding in particular Christmas traditions and customs of New Braunfels, Texas, is interesting and enlightening, no indeed, Christmas stockings for Saint Nicholas' Day and/or at Christmas are actually not a pan German custom. For while in some parts of Germany, children hang out their stockings, in other parts, it is footwear that is placed outside of children's houses or rooms to be filled with sweets etc. Because yes, in Northern Germany, when I was a child (and before we immigrated to Canada), we put out our boots and/or shoes for Saint Nicholas and actually knew nothing of Christmas stockings, and that therefore, Kaderli in Molasses Cookies stating that Christmas stockings are supposedly the German way, well, this is actually only partially true and thus needs to be considered and taken with that proverbial grain of salt.