Christmas Baking

We are going to be spending Christmas with my parents this year and as has been the case since I was a little one (well old enough to wield a mixing spoon), I will be in charge of desserts. I thought I would share with you what I’m planning to make in case you are looking for some last-minute recipes!

My plan is to make cookies for the week and then a fancy dessert for Christmas dinner.

Cookies in my family are tough because Brian doesn’t really like chocolatey cookies, my mom doesn’t like super sweet confections and my dad always wants the cookies his mom made growing up. So I’ve decide to make three kids of cookies, so everyone can be happy (gosh, I’m so nice, aren’t I?).

Despite his lukewarm feelings towards chocolate, Brian loves these chocolate chip cookies.

Source: macheesmo.com via Natalie on Pinterest

 

They’re the ones whose dough I mention in my ‘about me’ list – I keep it in the fridge so I can make a few at a time (and occasionally eat for dinner). I follow the recipe to-the-tee. They are amazing. For real. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G.

For my mom, I’m making peanut butter cookies, with a little twist. I take a basic PB cookie recipe and right when I take them out of the oven, I stick a mini Reese’s cup in the middle. It’s like those peanut blossom things, but waaaay better. ‘Cause the Reese’s stays soft and sorta just melts in your mouth… mmm…

Source: joythebaker.com via Natalie on Pinterest

I use Joy the Baker’s Flourless PB Cookie recipe as a base, but I add some things to it to make it extra chewy. To her recipe, I add:

1 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp flour (you can omit if you want to go gluten-free, but I think it makes the cookies super chewy)

I use a teaspoon to drop the cookies on a cookie sheet (they grow a lot, so I think it’s better to keep ’em small). Bake them for 8-10 minutes. While they’re baking, unwrap lots and lots of mini Reese’s cups (some will be for nibbling while you work). When the cookies done  baking, pull them out and smush a Reese’s cup in the middle of each one.

You can also do this in a mini muffin tin a la Iowa Girl Eats. I like the look of the drop cookies, myself, but they would be tasty either way!

My last cookie will be my grandmother’s Toffee Whites, which have nothing to do with toffee or anything white and I can’t tell you anything about them because the recipe is closely guarded. {For real, my aunt was only given it after she had been married to my uncle, my grandmother’s son, for 15 years.} Maybe I’ll share a pic with you once they’re made… maybe…

And for Christmas dinner, Nikki’s Bread Pudding. She doesn’t have the recipe up on her blog, but maybe if we bribe her she’ll share it with us. It is soooo good and includes a delish homemade caramel sauce… mmm…

I hope to share pictures of all my Christmas baking adventures next week, but in the meantime, what are you making for the holidays? Anything secret family recipes up your sleeve?

Christmas Crafts – Sweet Treats

Brian and I ended up making three of the gifts (well five, technically, but three are in the same “category” so I’m grouping them together… this will make more sense soon) I featured in my Crafty Christmas series pre-Christmas.  I was very excited to try a few handmade gifts and now I’ve totally caught the bug and can’t wait to try more adventurous handmade items.

The biggest undertaking was the sweet treats I made, mostly because I (for some unknown reason) decided to make them all in one morning.  Not the best plan as far as maintaining one’s sanity goes, but thankfully they all turned out very well (if I do say so myself!).

The first of the three treats, and the most challenging, was salted chocolate caramel from Smitten Kitchen.

Cooling Caramel

As far as I’m concerned, she is a total genius and I knew I could trust her recipe (which was important since I was giving these to my *new* relatives and I didn’t want them to gag).  And, oh man, she didn’t disappoint.  These were so amazingly rich, I still can’t believe I made them!

Heating the caramel to 255 degrees

I decided to individually wrap them in wax paper, which was easier than I thought it would be and, with all the traveling, kept the caramels looking good (and not all stuck together).

Chopping and wrapping the caramels

I followed her recipe pretty much to a tee, so I’m not going to do deprive you of her wit and humor by summarizing it here.  Just go check it out on Smitten Kitchen – trust me, you won’t be disappointed.

The other two treats I made were Oreo and Nutterbutter balls, a recipe I found at Bakerella, another baking master.  Initially I was only going to make one treat to bring with me to Brian’s family Kentucky, but these were just too easy and too tasty sounding to not do.  Plus Carlos kept telling me about how amazing they were…

Dipping the Oreo Balls

There are only really four steps to this recipe: first crush the cookies, then mix in cream cheese and make into 1″ balls, dip the balls in chocolate, cool and eat!  Boy oh boy are they scrumptious…

Crushing cookies in the food processor

Requisite picture of Chambers helping

Putting the finishing touches on the Mint Oreo balls

A few notes on the cookie balls (I’m just not crazy about this name – anyone have any cuter suggestions?):

1. I found that softening the cream cheese in the microwave for 10-15 seconds helped a lot with the mixing process and didn’t alter the consistency.
2. I dipped the Oreo balls in white chocolate and the Nutter Butter balls in milk chocolate.
3. I don’t have a double boiler to melt the chocolate for dipping, but a glass bowl over a pot of slowly boiling water worked just fine.
4. I added about six drops of mint extract to part of the Oreo mix and it was like Thin Mint heaven.  I also added green globs to the top of the mint Oreo balls to distinguish them – I need some tips on using a decorating tool.

What do you think? Have you made anything like these before?  Any tips out there for me?