Christmas Cookies 2014

I love Christmas cookies. I like that I get to be in charge of them every year (for both sides of the family) and I like making something new each year.

I asked my family for their requests. I received these: almond crack candy, Mexican wedding cakes, peanut butter blossoms with dark chocolate kisses, and chocolate peppermint crackles. Yay! The chocolate chip peppermint crackles were new to me, and I added Cinnamon Sugar cut-outs to round it out.

 

These didn't make it to the Christmas platters but I made gingerbread cake balls for a work holiday potluck. They were a hit!

 

A picture of my handy chocolate melter. I never thought it would get so much use. Melting chocolate for strawberries, for candy melts, cake balls, and now making my own body butter/creams (a later recipe?)

 

Back to cookies.

The Chocolate Chip Peppermint Crackle cookies were better than I expected. They had crushed peppermint candies inside the dough, tasted brownie-like, and then were topped with a piece of peppermint candy to make them pretty. I was so glad these made it on the platter!

The peanut blossoms are a pretty standard cookie but my Jimmy said these tasted better than usual. It's that love ingredient, you know! And the dark chocolate kisses were a great choice. Good job, Richie!

 

 

The Mexican Wedding Cake cookies. Can you believe that I didn't even try these? They are made with pecans. I'm okay with pecans but the peanut butter blossoms and almondy candy called my name so much more.

 

 

I really, really enjoyed making royal icing this year. I had this plan of making gnome cookies for over a month. I wanted to try an easier technique using royal icing and it worked so well! I made one huge batch of royal icing and then separated it into a few bowls for different colors. I only made one consistency of royal icing- thin enough to spread but thick enough to stay put. I used this woman's blog for her technique.

Here's Frosty the Snowman, complete with a flower on his hat! These were fun but required a lot of patience. The colors needed to be piped one color at a time, so they didn't run together. I'd wait 15-20 minutes and then go back to the cookie with another color or to add a detail on top of a color. They were worth it. I think they were darn near perfect.

 

One gnome as Santa!

 

The gnomes were the most fun. I knew my sister would love them :) I was even able to add the tiny eyeballs once I became familiar with the consistency of the royal icing. Delicate work.

 

The cookies dried overnight but I still took care that they wouldn't smear. I kept recalling my Thanksgiving cookie fiasco so I made sure the covered pan had plenty of room above each cookie and then I carried the tray on my lap during the car ride. They made it!

 

Yay for cookies!

 

Click here for the stolen recipe for Gingerbread Cake.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Cinnamon Sugar Cut-out Cookies.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Hershey's Peanut Butter Blossoms.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Mexican Wedding Cake Cookies (or Snowball Cookies).

Click here for the stolen recipe for Chocolate Chip Peppermint Crunch Crackle Cookies.

There is no shared recipe for the Almond Crack Candy. Sorry!

 

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Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread

This recipe has been all the rage on the various food blogs that I read every day. It has looked so pretty and I knew I had to try it. It has staple ingredients so I could make it whenever I had time. That's the hardest thing about this recipe- the time waiting for the dough to rise, two different times.

I thought it would be a good treat to make for future overnight guests. But maybe not. It would take a good long time to shape, let rise, bake, and then cool. I guess it depends on how much time you're working with.

The pieces really do pull apart easily. The bread isn't too sweet, but the sugar that I sprinkled on top of the bread became crusty and sweet. It is delicious.

I hope it freezes well!

Click here for the stolen recipe for Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread.

Cinnamon Roll Bread

Seriously. One of the easiest recipes ever. This "bread" was a few ingredients mixed together, pour it in a pan, let it rest for 15 minutes, and then press in a brown sugar mixture on top. Bake for 30 minutes. Drizzle with icing.

I think this is the lazy (wo)man's cinnamon roll recipe. This would a great recipe for breakfast guests- something you can whip together and serve with coffee.



I took this picture to show you the brown sugar crusty goodness when it came out of the oven. It was bubbling and the house smelled AMAZING.

I'm going to keep this recipe handy. I can also see myself whipping this up for work peeps and their coffee.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Cinnamon Roll Bread.

Cream Cheese Cinnamon Rolls

My friend Ann told me that she made this recipe with great success. I had Cinnamon Rolls on my summer list and with Father's Day I wanted to make these for my sweet. He has a love for Cinnabon and he has been denying himself after reading how many calories each roll has! I don't think these are calorie free but maybe a bit better for you since they're homemade. They did get a "Very Good" rating from him, so I think we'll make these again :)

I have a slight fear of yeast so I was pretty nervous about making the dough. The dough part was still pretty tricky, especially rolling up it up "tightly" but I did the best that I could. I figured even if they were a loose roll, the taste would be unaffected.

Cream cheese is layered into the dough, adding a little something something to the flaky roll. Mmmmmm. My guy loves his cream cheese so I'm glad this recipe included that too!

Before the rolls were refrigerated and they were allowed to "rise"-


I refrigerated the rolls overnight and pulled them out about 45 minutes before I expected my husband to get up from his slumber. He had great timing- they were cooling slightly as he came downstairs and I had the SW pancakes almost ready too!

The rolls before baking-


Done!



I took it easy on the icing and I'm glad. I love when rolls are bread-like but also a little gooey.

I hope my husband doesn't object if I make these again! These would be great for overnight guests.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Cream Cheese Cinnamon Rolls.

Cinnamon Bun Ebelskiver

We all had our Valentines breakfast of Cinnamon Bun filled pancakes with cream cheese icing and Eggs. Yum.

Click here for the stolen recipe.

These are quite a bit of effort. There is the pancake mix to make (involving whipped egg whites, a bit more time consuming), and then a cinnamon filling to make, and then the cream cheese icing. And then you cook the things. It is a wonderful treat though!