Springerle cookies

My friend made me springerle cookies last night.

Of course I had to look up their history.

Germanic pagan tribes used to sacrifice animals to the gods in winter as an offering to get an early spring

Wait, is this a thing? Cause if it is, I’m going to the market and stocking up on all the animals I can afford to sacrifice.

Also, I picture this as an ancient version of Groundhog Day.

The anise-flavored springerle cookies were made by poor people who couldn’t afford to sacrifice their animals. So they made cookies and stamped animals into them.

I mean, guys, if an early spring is on the line here, I really don’t think an animal cracker is gonna cut it with the gods. In fact, I bet the weather I have to endure until March is actually a punishment for all eternity from the gods because of the crappy animal crackers they got. This weather makes so much more sense now.

Eventually, the cookies became ways to educate people who couldn’t read or write…with Bible scenes.

They were even made as betrothal tokens (wait, could I be engaged?)

Exchanging the cookies was equivalent to exchanging Christmas cards today.

Let me get this right.

These cookies were dead animals, books, the Internet, diamond rings, and Christmas cards.

How were you supposed to know if someone was proposing to you or just wanted to wish you a Merry Christmas?

So I ate the springerle (as evidenced in the pic)…