Repostería

In Spain, every decent-sized town has a convent run by nuns who make sweets and pastries. I remember my Great Aunt ‘Cha Cha’ Pepa taking me to a whitewashed convent on the outskirts of Aguila de la Frontera. We went to buy some biscuits but it felt more like we were leaving a baby there, to become an orphan. There was a slightly clandestine air to the way we had to leave our money in a rotating door in the convent wall. We put in our money and spun the door around. There was a little noise of our coins being taken and then we opened the door again to find a box of polvorones (individually-wrapped little almond and lard biscuits). They are called polvorones after the Spanish word polvo (dust). They were so light and delicate that they almost turned to dust when you picked them up. Unfortunately, the nuns kept their recipes tightly to themselves and I have never found a recipe for polvorones that comes close to theirs.