Tomorrow I'm having an Open House for my business -- so far I think three actual customers are going to be coming, as well as Iris, who is coming out of loyalty and love of cookies.
I'm making fudge and snickerdoodles, and will probably make another kind of bar cookie (trying to decide between raspberry and chocolate revel.) I found myself calling my mother for her recommendations, and she rattled off a dizzying list of cookies and bars on her standard bake list.
Of course, my mom always has a could of hundred people around during the Christmas season, and she's been doing this for a bit longer than I have. But it made me realize that I don't have much on my Must Bake for Christmas List.
I always make snickerdoodles and fudge, and I will probably add peppermint bark, chocolate chip cookies made with red and green M&Ms, and those peanut blossom cookies with the chocolate star in the middle. When Hambet is older I will probably add rolled and decorated sugar cookies.
So how about you? What's on your yearly to-bake list?
I do not have one because besides my kids, I do not have many people to bake for. My parents do not eat cookies. Maybe my brothers will and I will bake anyway. What'sn Christmas without baking?
I would put Dree's "Award Winning" (lol) chocolate chip oatmeal cookies and my lemon poppy seed shortbread. But I need a cookie like your Peppermint Bark that is festive.
I think I am going to adopt people to bake for, like my Amish neighbors.
um... I don't have a yearly to-bake list? I think last year for Christmas Eve when relatives came one of us probably made 100% whole wheat choc-chip cookies from a Betty Crocker cookie book recipe, and probably that recipe was for regular flour and otherwise unadjusted by us -- perhaps that is why they tend to be a tad crispy...
Those cookies are kind of our standby. Maybe we should use a new recipe. Sticking with the 100% ww though.
Lol...Dree having award-winning cookies. She probably thinks that she's a real person now.
This yr I decided to make various truffles and bourban balls for the family (my husband's 7 siblings and their families). I usually make fudge or pressed cookies, or hot chocolate mix in a tin.
I DO have a must-bake list. Cookies are my very favorite dessert of all, and they would be tops on my list for "last meal" wishes.
Let's see. Every single year I make:
1. Shortbread. Yummo.
2. My Aunt Sissy's Orange Slice Cookies. Double yummo, and I can make myself good and sick with them.
3. My mother-in-law's recipe for Butter Cookies, with a candied cherry pressed into the center. They're delicious!
4. Magic Cookie Bars off the label for Eagle Brank Sweetened condensed milk.
5. Coconut Washboards--which really don't taste that coconutty. They just taste delish.
Those are the "have-to's". I have a huge repertoire of others that I make "sometimes." But I'm always looking for new recipes!
1. biscotti (very traditional, anise, almonds in some, NO dipping in chocolate (schifo!), NO strange additions)
2. panforte
3. pannetone
4. brutti ma buoni (chocolate and hazelnut crunchy yumbombs)
5. Pane Toscana
6. St. Lucia Rolls
7. Baguettes (so that we can have proper French bread on Christmas day, when the bakeries are closed)
8. Yule log
9. Some sort of gingerbread cookies
10. Some sort of gingerbread loaf
11. Persimmon cookies
12. holly cookies made of cornflakes and marshmallow.
13. Cognac truffles
14. Calvados truffles
15. ricciarelli
16. nougat (this year I am making hard mandorla as well as soft montelimar-style nougat)
17. Probably foccaccia for making pannini with leftover goose
I've got about 20 dozen in the freezer so far...and a bunch of dough in the fridge waiting to be dealt with.
The tried and true: snickerdoodles, kahlua gingerbread, split seconds (shortbread-like with jelly in the middle, the only fruity cookie I make), fudge, vanilla caramels, treasure balls, brickle bars, those no-bake chocolate peanut butter oat things, and good ol' cutout cookies.
New this year: Andes mint cookies (recipe up on my blog today!), whipped shortbread (just got a cookie press!), holly clusters, peppermint squares, mint chocolate trees, and lemon drops.
Lest y'all think I am nuts, my family does not eat a lot of cookies, but I loooove to make them. Obviously. So I have found a charitable outlet for my baking activities, which makes it even more fun for me. :)
I haven't done much baking for Christmas recently, my daughters kind of took it over and now that only one is left at home I haven't picked it back up.
My favorites are:
Springerle (must find my molds!)
Lebkuchen
Spritz cookies (with the press)
Candy cane cookies
Stained Glass cookies (sugar cookies with crunched up hard candies that melt into looking like stained glass)
My daughters are big into the chocolate chip and variations cookies.
My mother-in-law (may she rest in peace) always made snickerdoodles and English Toffee bars - I think my sis-in-law has taken over that tradition - also the Date Nut Bread (that my dh also will cook from the tattered and oil-stained recipe card)
I am not that fond of gingerbread to eat, but I might take the time to make some gingerbread kids to hang on the tree - cat food?
This year, I WILL make my buche de noel! I have to teach eldest daughter how......
Erik,
Would you be willing to share your panettone recipe? My last one, which was delicious, was for the ahem bread machine. I would like a non-bread machine recipe.
Or I could do it the authentic way and buy it from an Italian market for lots of $$$.
Just to say, it makes me feel immeasurably better that while perusing Erik's impressive list of baking, I came across marshmallow and cornflake Christmas wreaths. :-)
Let's see,
Split Seconds! (Neat to see someone else makes them too!)
Springerle (called them "anise cookies" in our house)
Persimmon cookies
White roll-out cookies
Crisp Oatmeal Cookies
Almond Crescents
Rice Krispie Logs
Yay for Christmas!
I definitely have a baking list for Christmas. Each of my five kids and my dh, my mom and my dad all demand their favorites.
Lots of chocolate chips, oatmeal, gingerbread men, Tons of sugar cookies, chocolate pepper cookies (Martha Stewart recipe), butter cookies, coconut macaroons and pffernuese (I am sure I spelled that wrong).
Pansy,
I will be happy to post my recipe, as soon as I find it (it is about now that I dig up the baking recipes that lie unused for months). Since I am furiously preparing for my talk tomorrow, I will probably not get to it until the end of the week (feel free to pester me if I have forgotten). Meanwhile, Trader Joe's sells a reasonably priced Panettone that is quite good (just had a slice of it for breakfast).