Terry Baker's Springerle

4 eggs
1/4 teaspoon anise extract
Zest from 3 lemons
2 cups granulated sugar
3 to 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1. Beat eggs, anise extract and zest together with a mixer at medium speed. Beat in sugar gradually until creamy. Sift flour and baking powder together. Stir flour mixture into batter gradually, stopping when it get to stiff to stir.
2. Sprinkle 1/4 cup flour onto a pastry cloth or stiff paper. Rub cloth with flour and sprinkle a little more flour on it. Scoop 1/4 of the dough onto cloth. Dust with flour and pat into a sheet 1/4-inch to 3/8-inch thick. Dust and rub gently with fingers until no stickiness remains.
3. Press a clean, dry springerle mold firmly onto dough. Cut around mold by pressing a knife, cutter or wheel onto dough. Wipe blade clean with each cut. Remove scraps. Lift corner of cloth or paper to turn each cookie onto hand. Transfer to a waxed paper-covered baking sheet pressed side up. If dough sticks to mold during stamping, remove it with a toothpick, flour the mold and continue. Don’t use wet molds.
4. Let cookies dry 12 hours uncovered. This preserves the picture.
5. Preheat oven to 325F.
6. Bake cookies 15 minutes. Cool and let dry 24 hours. Peel cookies from the waxed paper. Store loosely under a cloth so that drying may continue for several weeks. Or freeze cookies in a zip-top storage bag after drying two days.
7. Remove from freezer before serving. Cookies will get too hard to eat after one or two weeks.
8. To use as ornament, use a toothpick to make a hole before cookies dry and thread strings through holes once the cookies are dry.

Recipe courtesy of Terry Baker, Calvert, Texas