For John Cleveland, who with wife Roni Cleveland runs Post & Beam, a California-soul restaurant in the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, the Thanksgiving season begins when he makes the first batch of mincemeat cookies. Based on a recipe that his family has been making every holiday since his grandmother’s childhood, the cookies are fluffy, crumbly, rich with duck fat and warm with the spices of the season.
With much of his family on the East Coast, Cleveland can’t always fly out to enjoy the cookies over the holidays, so he started making them for himself and, eventually, the patrons of his restaurant, who can enjoy them on their own or in a luxurious trifle dessert. Cleveland makes his own mincemeat for the cookies, which you can purchase from the restaurant directly, but any jarred mincemeat works.
