Hanukkah, Yuletide, Christmas, Kwanzaa — on dining-room tables, these fêtes take the shape of starry sugar cookies, spangled with sprinkles; pfeffernüsse, prickly with pepper; delicate linzertorte, layered with jam. Around the world, many of the season’s favorite sweets recall stories that anchor our cultural identities. Jewish people eat jelly doughnuts to rejoice in the temple oil that burned eight days upon Jerusalem’s liberation from Greek rule some 2,200 years ago.