#### General Notes
       
       - Concerning the baking of macaroons:
         The macaroons are very soft when they are still hot, so they
         need to cool a bit before they can be taken from the tray
         without breaking them. This also makes it very easy to bake
         them too long because it's easy to think that they aren't
         done yet even though they become much harder later. They
         should still be a bit chewy on the inside when they are cool.
       - The recipes in this section contain a lot more sugar and fat
         than I usually use when baking cookies and cakes throughout
         the rest of the year. This is in part due to tradition. Old
         cookbooks often used more sugar and fat in Christmas cookies
         because those ingredients were expensive and only used in
         large amounts on special occasions. The other reason is that
         using lots of sugar and fat makes the cookies stay fresh for
         longer, which is important because Christmas cookies are often
         eaten over a period of a month or longer. It would be nice to
         properly study how long the cookies stay fresh with different
         amounts of sugar and fat, but I don't have the time for that.