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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Rhubarb Ginger Crumble

I love when my husband utters these words- "I think this is one of the best things you've made yet."

 

I couldn't go wrong combining his loves of rhubarb and ginger. Really. That man is pretty easy to please :)

Another BEB recipe. Seriously, run don't walk to her blog. She's fabulous. I think I'm a groupie.

I did add a bit more than the 2T of chopped ginger. My husband REALLY loves ginger. I knew we wouldn't be disappointed with a bit more.

I also was leery when I accidentally tasted some of the crumble. It is just flour and butter... so it tasted really bland and dry. DUH. You need to eat it with the rhubarb, ginger and sugar mixture. It is plenty sweet and flavorful.

 

My husband was in heaven. I think he was tempted to eat some for breakfast this morning but he has these weird dessert/breakfast rules for himself. (I don't share such rules!) Well, and then I met his demand for pancake balls, bacon, and eggs for breakfast so he didn't really need any dessert. I'm sure he'll have some for lunch :)

Seriously, you should make this. Six simple ingredients! Rhubarb, ginger, sugar, flour, salt, butter. Easy peasy.

OH MY! Just realized I didn't add the little bit of (divided) sugar to the crumble mixture. That's why it was bland! I forgot the 1/2 cup of sugar. And it still tasted good. It will taste even better next time when I make it correctly! My husband's mind WILL BE BLOWN!

Click here for the stolen recipe for Rhubarb Ginger Crumble.

 

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Ginger Beer Lemonade

I didn't plan on making this but I noticed a few cans of ginger beer in the fridge (leftover from my husband's cocktails) and I remembered seeing this recipe in my blog reader a few days ago. Why not?

We found the drink to be very tart and more on the lemon side, but the ginger beer was a nice subtle flavor. We still much prefer the ginger tea lemonade that we cook up for guests, but this was far less work!

We made a double batch. I didn't believe that the recipe made 4 servings as it was. The above picture is after I took a half glass and Jim helped himself to a full glass.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Ginger Beer Lemonade.

 

Asian Chicken Noodle Soup

I have joined my husband in his love of GINGER.  This soup also has a lot of the flavors that I like- soy sauce, lime, hot sauce, cilantro and ginger (I added extra).  Mmmmmmmmmmm.

It was a pretty good soup.  I think I would make it again without the noodles though.  The flavors were great but I can do without the carbs/calories of the noodles.  I'd much rather eat a healthier carb!  

Look at my pretty Dragon bowl from Japan!  (Thanks Kiki!)

I was cooking for one (Jim was out of town) so I portioned the rest of it out for future meals.  I froze them in Ziploc bags.

Note:  I couldn't really find "Chinese noodles" so I used rice vermicelli noodles from the Asian area of my grocery store.


Click here for the stolen recipe for Asian Chicken Noodle Soup.

Gingerbread Cake

I had a plan when making this cake.  I knew that it would end up in small balls.  But first we each had a piece to "taste test".  It's a spicy, classic gingerbread cake!

I put the baked cake through the food procesor to make it into crumbs.  And I added just a bit of this "natural" caramel creamer to make it wet enough to roll into balls.

Cake balls!

I am working in stages.  I put these caked balls into the fridge for another time.  Probably tomorrow night I'll melt the chocolate and cover these babies!  Without sticks, so more like truffles.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Classic Gingerbread Cake.

Ginger Tea Lemonade

This was pretty fantastic! Jim loved it. It was easy but took a while. You need to brew tea, and let it cool. And simultaneously you can make the ginger simple syrup, and let that cool too. Then juice the lemons in a pitcher. Strain the ginger bits from the syrup, and add everything together.

I wish I had made a double batch. This was was 5 glasses of tea. I'm thinking of making this for a girls' dinner or summer grilling party. YUM.

Jim has the great idea of adding his ginger liqueur to this.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Ginger Tea Lemonade.

Dark Chocolate Tart with Gingersnap Crust

In this house we have a favorite chocolate tart-like cake, it's actually a flourless cake called Chocolate Intensity. I did decide to experiment with a new recipe and I'm glad I did. This recipe won't take the place of Jim's beloved Chocolate Intensity because it is different. It's darker with a hint of spice (cinnamon, ground black pepper, and ginger in the crust). Yum.

It uses A LOT of chocolate. 12 ounces of bittersweet, to be exact.


It was a really simple recipe, almost foolproof. I love press-in-the-pan kinds of crusts. Even better when its pure cookie and butter goodness.

I made a little bit of homemade whipped cream, barely sweet because I knew the chocolate tart would be all the sweet I'd need. Small slivers of tart for both my Sweetie and me.


Lots of leftovers. I did consider making small tartlettes and freezing the small tarts for later but I think the large tart pan just really needed to be used. It gets lonely in storage, you know?



What to do with the leftovers... ?

Click here for the stolen recipe for Dark Chocolate Tart with Gingersnap Crust. It's from one of my favorite bloggers.

Ginger Beef Stir Fry

After being sick for so long it was really nice to try a new meal!

I've never tried this cut of meat, and I found it so-so. I think next time I would splurge with something more expensive. I also probably put too many vegetables (is that possible?) in the dish and so the sauce was spread a little thin. Next time I would stick to the proportions of the recipe or make more sauce! Oh, and the plum sauce was a new ingredient for me too. I found it quite easily in the ethnic aisle of Cub Foods.

Our verdict? Good. We will make it again! We love any meal that incorporates so many vegetables, an Asian flavor, fresh ginger, and my beloved Jasmine rice. Mmmmm.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Ginger Beef Stir Fry.

Ginger Pumpkin Muffins

These were bound to make both Jim and myself happy- they combine our loves of ginger and pumpkin!

These were very good. Jim ate one and when I told him he could have another he was obviously very happy. He said they are "very, very good". So glad :)

I actually made these not for us but for James. At naptime he told me it was the Sun's birthday and we need cake and presents. I went with it because it was a good way to get him to actually take a nap- if there was something to look forward to afterwards. So the muffins will serve as the cake. I don't know what we're going to do about the presents :)

Yeah, that's my muffin in the front. Its half eaten and then I thought maybe you'd like to see the inside of these muffins.

The recipe called for 1/2 cup of crystallized ginger. I didn't think James would care for that so I substituted 1/2 cup of mini chips. I know he'll love those.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Ginger Pumpkin Muffins. This is a recipe from one of my favorite bloggers. She does some great recipe comparisons.

Giant Ginger Cookies

My big sis needs a little cheering up so I baked some cookies for her. Okay, for all of us. I ended up only having a half cookie (3.5 points) but Jim enjoyed a whole one. He is a sucka for ginger anything :)

I hope Ana likes these! They are HUGE and gingerlicious. Martha just doesn't fail me!

Click here for the stolen recipe for Giant Ginger Cookies.

Birthday Dessert

Jim requested his favorite dessert, his beloved Chocolate Intensity Cake. I also just had to make an ice cream and I decided to make a ginger flavored ice cream- White Chocolate & Fresh Ginger. I used an extra little bit of ginger because he loves it so much and I also added a splash of his ginger liqueur, knowing that alcohol helps an ice cream stay smooth and creamy (it doesn't freeze rock solid).

The Chocolate Intensity Cake is a cake I've made several times. It's a flourless chocolate cake- I don't even know if it's cake-like, its a buttery chocolate :) The ingredient list is short- lots of butter, lots of bittersweet chocolate, sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Like the name, its just chocolate intensity. And then there is a chocolate ganache on top. Yum.

So the ice cream was pretty intense too. It was definitely gingery. The picture may look simple but the flavors were very in your face. A little of each goes a long way! The cake makes a single 9 inch cake, and it probably has 8-10 servings.

Click here for the stolen recipe for Chocolate Intensity Cake.

Click here for the stolen recipe for White Chocolate & Fresh Ginger Ice Cream, from none other than David Lebovitz, though this is NOT in the ice cream bible The Perfect Scoop.

This Chocolate Intensity cake was from last year's Father's Day. I wonder why I didn't blog about it before??

Domaine de Canton Margarita

For Father's Day I bought my wonderful husband a bottle of a liqueur. He is in love with all things ginger! So I went with a ginger theme- chocolate with ginger pieces (Chocomize), ginger chips (Williams Sonoma, baking?), and this ginger liqueur. It is French Ginger Liqueur with cognac. He immediately read the recipe booklet and made a drink at noon! It is this drink though there are several that we will be investigating very soon!

Domaine de Canton Margarita

2 parts Domaine de Canton
1 part tequila
1 splash Triple Sec
1/2 part fresh lime juice
1 splash fresh orange or pineapple juice

Serve on the rocks.

Oatmeal Ginger Cookies

I love the Cook's Illustrated line of books. I love my Baking Illustrated. I wanted to make some cookies for a staff bbq, but it was a last minute decision so I found a recipe that used the ingredients I had handy. I also wanted something that would be okay at room temperature (or even hot weather) until lunch time. You just can't go wrong with oatmeal cookies too :)


I'm not a fan of raisins so I made the variation of the recipe which was Oatmeal Ginger. Ginger is another favorite in this house of mine. My husband is cuckoo for ginger!


Simple, great cookies!

Click here for the stolen recipe for Chewy Oatmeal Raisin Cookies (and the Oatmeal Ginger variation).

More Ginger Ale!

My husband tried a different recipe for ginger ale- it involved cooking the ginger and maybe making a simple syrup (I wasn't there), instead of the carbonation process with yeast.

We liked the recipe but liked the carbonation of the first recipe.

I like his determination to get the perfect recipe :)

Ginger Ale

We've enjoyed great homemade tasting ginger ale at one of our favorite restaurants Big Bowl (Asian/Thai). Ginger ale from the grocery store- Canada Dry, etc.- just doesn't taste the same. We found a recipe online for home brewed ginger ale using yeast, grated ginger, sugar, water, and lemon juice.

Wow! My husband did good! I didn't have a part in this recipe so really and truly this is all stolen! I am just enjoying the beverage :)


Jim needed to strain the ginger ale from the bottle to keep the ginger and yeast residue from our glasses.


It was a fairly easy process (I heard) and my husband just couldn't wait for it to be done. It needed to sit for 24-48 hours to carbonate or ferment, or whatever it did.

Click here for the stolen recipe for ginger ale!