Welcome to the last Let’s Lunch of 2014! This month’s theme is non-traditional traditions. Although my family does have a pretty non-traditional Christmas dinner (Chinese hot pot!), since I’ve posted about that in the past, I thought I’d turn the theme around and post about a traditional non-tradition: something in the spirit of Christmas tradition that I haven’t done in the past.

Growing up in the Midwest, I loved a white Christmas, but the very best Christmases were the ones when my parents would make the 24-hour drive south to Fort Worth so that we could spend the holiday with my grandparents. Most of my favorite Christmas cookies are ones I can remember my grandmother making, and although she’s no longer with us, I still cherish the pages in my cookbook written in her handwriting.

This shortbread is one of her recipes, with an extra Texas twist in honor of my parents’ Austin neighborhood where Christmas happens these days: rosemary. Rosemary grows by the side of the road in their Hill Country neighborhood, in whacking great shrubs that make the little plastic herb packages I get here in the north look like a joke. All you have to do is brush your hand over it to come away sweetly fragranced.  It’s not the Christmas I grew up with, but it’s a tradition I can definitely get behind.

The recipe after the jump!

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