"Stop fighting it," Nana chided, her hands moving with the speed of a much younger woman. "You have to coax the dough. Press it. Fold it. See? It wants to be a cracker."

Slide the parchment onto a baking sheet and bake for 10 to 12 minutes until the edges are golden brown.

"Wait," Nana commanded as I reached for a hot circle.

The process was not the sterile, precise chemistry of a modern cooking show. It was alchemy. Nana didn't measure with cups; she measured with "enough."

I wanted to cut them into squares. Boring, standard squares.

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Finally, the moment of truth. I took a bite of the duck-shaped cracker.

Poke small holes in each cracker using a fork or toothpick to prevent them from puffing up during baking.

Twenty minutes felt like twenty years. But finally, we retrieved the log. It was firm and cold. We rolled it out on the counter. It fought us again, springing back, trying to stay thick. But we persisted, pressing down with the rolling pin until it was a thin, speckled carpet of beige.

Then came the hardest part: the wait. We formed the dough into a log, wrapped it in wax paper, and banished it to the refrigerator.