Of dust and lard: Spanish seasonal sweets

One of the most traditional customs of Spanish Christmas festivities, which don’t forget go on through the New Year to Epiphany (or Twelfth Night or Three Kings Day) on January 6th, is the inclusion at almost every get-together of sweet dishes such as those pictured above and most, if not all, come down to us from the Arabs.
Polvorones come at the top of the list. In a fanciful derivation by Prospero, the name comes from polvo, which means ‘dust’ among other things we don’t need to go into here. Whether he gets the idea from their taste or from the fact that they are often sprinkled (espolvoreado) with caster sugar is uncertain. In any case, they are made with pig’s lard and almonds and nuts and all things nice. (One of our regular readers has expressed his disgust about these traditional sweets, and asked what to do with them when you get them. The answer: Say thank you very much, how lovely and delicious, and hand them on to a Spanish neighbour making sure the giver doesn’t know the receiver…)>

Mantecados are another matter. The name comes from manteca, which means lard (mantequilla, on the other hand, is a diminutive of manteca and means butter). The modern version comes from the 16th Century during which the town of Estepa, in the province of Sevilla (others say Antequera), had an excess of grain and pigs. Thus, a mantecado is a mixture of the two, plus honey or sugar and, depending on the recipe, almonds and other nuts. These days, a lighter version using olive or other oils, is easily available. Prospero deems these as delicious…
Mazapán is marzipan and we don’t need to go on too much about it, except to say that this, too, comes down from the Arabs, to whom there are those who feel we must be grateful for it. There are references to it, or something very similar, from the 6th Century BC in Ancient Greece, so if you don’t know about by now, you probably never will.
Turrón, now, needs a whole article to itself (but we’re not promising one). There are so many versions of it in Spain that there isn’t the space here to deal with each. The two most popular versions, however, are duro (hard) and blando (soft), though they are better known as alicante and jijona respectively, which come from their alleged places of origin. The alicante variety is better known throughout the world as ‘nougat’, which we therefore don’t need to describe. Jijona is pretty much a beaten up version of the other, though we’re sure its manufacturers would disagree. In any case, they both contain almonds, nuts and honey and the second variety is a lot easier on the teeth.
However, other varieties can contain dried fruit, marzipan, crema (a bakery filling made from egg yolks and not to be confused with cream, which is called nata) and such a range of other ingredients that it is best to try first at a specialized shop, the nearest of which is in either La Línea or Algeciras.
The idea is to spread a selection of these on a platter for the unexpected guest (okay, the expected as well, then) during this season, preferably accompanied by a glass of anis dulce or other suitably sweet alcoholic beverage. You will notice that many shops and banks have a little table set aside from which customers are expected to partake even without being expressly invited. Nice custom, that…