Christmas Cookie Thread

greenspun.com : LUSENET : FRL friends : One Thread

In gratitude to my fellow FRlians I offer the following as an addition to your cookie repetoire for the upcoming holiday season (and cheaper to mail than the traditional fruitcake-but fruit-ful:

Cherry Vanilla Chip Cookies

Heat oven to 350.

In a large bowl combine:

1 C light brown sugar 6 squares (1 oz ea) white baking choclate, melted and cooled slightly 3 eggs 1/2 C vegetable shortening 1/4 C melted butter 1/4 C granulated sugar'

Beat at medium speed of elec mixer until well blended.

Add:

3 c flour 1 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp salt

Beat at low speed until soft dough forms. Stir in:

1 C vanilla baking chips 1/2 C maraschino cherrie (I like to cut them into a leasts twelfths, but some like quarters( !/2 C coarstley chopped almonds (optional)

Drop dough by heaping teaspoons 2" apart onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 8-12 minites or until light and golden brown.

Cool completely.

Enjoy y:all! as capn would say!

-- oogno86 (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 02, 2000

Answers

With more to follow! I have some fussy (read work) polish butter cookies that I will post the recipes to in the next few days. Try these and see what you think!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 02, 2000.

Bee, the cherry cookies sound great, but I just don't know about the polish cookies. What kind of polish do you use? I only have some "Scott's Liquid Gold", is that OK, or should I get some Pledge?

(I can't believe I beat Robt. Cook to this one)

:•)

----------------------------------------------------------

-- Lon Frank (lgal@exp.net), December 02, 2000.


Can these be sent UPS?

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), December 02, 2000.

UPS?

That's too slow.

Just fax me a couple dozen. (770) 956-8748. Or send them as an email attachment to FedupExpress and I'll get them Monday morning.

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Marietta, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), December 02, 2000.


Since we're on the topic of Christmas cookies...

I have been invited to a family party at the home of my girlfriend's parents. I would like to take two or three dozen homemade Christmas cookies. Can anyone recommend a goof-proof recipe that looks great but isn't difficult for an amateur to concoct?

I can make passable brownies without a mix, so I'm not a total dolt, but things like German stollens with powdered sugar on top is a bit advanced.

Thanks!

-- (kb8um8@yahoo.com), December 03, 2000.



LOL Lon!

Carlos, Robert, if you guys REALLY wanna box of cookies, ya gotta email me yer addy!

kb8, here a couple to try out; one no bake and one to bake:

RUM BALLS

Makes 4 doz

16 whole graham crackers, broken into pieces

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar, sifted (NOTE: divided uses)

1 1/2 cups flaked coconut

2 TB cocoa

1/4 cup honey

1/2 cup dark rum (Meyers preferred)

Grind the graham crackers to a fine meal in a blender or food processor (if using a blender grind the crackers in batches so you don't wind up with a flour on the bottom and chunks on top). If you have neither, you can put them in a sealed heavy duty plastic bag and make crumbs with a rolling pin or glass bottle. In a large bowl stir together the cracker crumbs 1 cup of the powdered sugar, the coconut, and cocoa. Add the honey and the rum gradually, stirring to moisten the dry ingredients. With the palms of your impeccably clean hands, roll scant teasponsfuls of the dough into balls, about 3/4" diameter. Roll the balls in a plate filled with the remaining 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar. Store in an airtight container for a least 1 week.

CHOCOLATE TOFFEE BARS

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Crust:

In a mixer bowl, combine:

1/2 cup softened butter

1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup sugar

Mix at low speed until mixture is crumbly. Press on bottom of 13 x 9 inch pan. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until crust is very lightly browned. Immediately sprinkle 1/2 cup real chocolate chips (semi- sweet or milk chocolate) and 1/2 cup butterscotch or vanilla milk chips over crust. Let stand 3-5 minutes or until soft. Evenly spread melted chips over crust (I find a plastic spatula or rubber scraper works best) over the surface of the crust. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup finely chopped or ground pecans. Let cool before cutting. To serve, cut bars into triangles, rectangles or squares and place in paper muffin liners or candy papers if ya wanna get fancy!

Keep me posted on your success!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 03, 2000.


Thanks, Aunt Bee! I'll go to Kroger's for supplies tonight. The party is Friday. Both recipes sound grand. Keep them coming, folks. I may have occasion to use others soon.

-- (kb8um8@yaho.com), December 04, 2000.

Hey Aunt Bee:

Do you have a recipe for potato chip cookies?

someone made them at a party last year and they were sooooooooooo good.

Thanks .

-- sumer (shh@aol.con), December 04, 2000.


Hey sumer,

I never heard of them til now. Are they like sweet and salty?? This looks like the best recipe I could find on SOAR. I will have to try this recipe out!

Potato Chip Cookies

Recipe By : Pillsbury Serving Size : 30 Preparation Time :0:15 Categories : Drop

Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method -------- ------------ -------------------------------- 3/4 cup sugar 3/4 cup butter 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 egg 1 1/2 cups flour 1 cup potato chips -- crushed

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Beat sugar, butter, vanilla and egg. Mix in dry ingredients, stir in potato chi ps. Drop by spoonfuls on cookie sheet, bake for 10 minutes. Cool 1 minutes then remove from sheet.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Let me know if they are like the ones you had. (The other recipes also add chopped nuts.) Enjoy!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 04, 2000.


What's SOAR? Link??

-- (kb8um8@yahoo.com), December 04, 2000.


kb8,

It's the Searchable Online Archived Recipe database at the University of California, Berkeley. Here that addy, as I not a linker!

http://soar.berkeley.edu/recipes/

TONS of recipes there. Not all good, but you some gems. Also beware that on weekends it is frequently so busy, their server gets tied up and it is inaccessible. Nothing fancy in terms of sites, mind you, just recipes! An incredible number. Cookie category alone is over 4000!!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 04, 2000.


Cool Beans! Great site, Aunt Bee.

I still appreciate your voice of experience. You sound as though you've baked long enough where you can look over a recipe and judge its possible problems before making it up. I don't have enough training to do that, and I'll skip the stories of the awful treats I baked when I was a teenager.

-- (kb8um8@yahoo.com), December 04, 2000.


Glad you liked it kb8!

Yep, been cookin' since I got my first cookbook when I was 6. And learned to cook my from grandmother who was born in 1890 and died on her 99th birthday! She was an excellent cook. I'm also an avid cookbook collector (have over 400)-although most are in storage pending a move in a year or two!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 04, 2000.


kb,

Can't go wrong with rumballs, dude. Even if for some Gawdforsaken, insane, ill-advised, tempestuous reason she should ever endeavor to separate from you - The Family will be on your side & continue to invite you to the innersanctum festivals {& if she shows, she'll never, ever hear the end of good ol' kb8}. It's all in the rumballs, toots.

Aunt Bee,

My mom used to make 'em using angel food cake - my recipes are all a- kimbo, due to a short-distance-yet-drawn-out move. I just found my first official cookbook - a spiral bound "Betty Crocker's Cook Book for Boys and Girls" in my mom's stuff. I have the old White House Cookbook from a few generations back & Carla Emery's mimeographed stuff on the bookshelf. I figure you personally are responsible for at least a good 5 pounds or more here, girl...

-- flora (***@__._), December 06, 2000.


flora~

I think I saw that recipe in James Beard's American Cookery Book, when I was researching. If you want it, let me know! Addy is real or I can post it here as you wish! And, admittedly, I will probably be responsible for more than 5 pounds here, and elsewhere! Not my decision, but of those that wish to partake! After all, 'tis the season!!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 06, 2000.



>{& if she shows, she'll never, ever hear the end of good ol' kb8

True! True. Secret: they call me "Dave" offline.

Okay, Anut Bee, I'm off to make Rumballs, sugar cookies with M & M's (for the kids), and a batch of brownies. Wish me luck. I'll give you an update tomorrow or so. Thanks again for your suggestions!

-- (kb8um8@yahoo.com), December 07, 2000.


kb8-

I DO wish you much luck in your baking endeavors! May your oven temp be even, your ingredients fresh, and may you not overlook one tiny line of the instructions! You WILL be successful!! I feel it in my bones (because you want to do it right!) I'll look forward to your update!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 07, 2000.


I know it's not a cookie, but how do you cook a "pork picnic roast"?

-- kritter (kritter@adelphia.net), December 07, 2000.

Like a can of soup.

On the dashboard for about three hours, in the sun.

... Or does somebody have a better idea? 8<)

... Ain't got no cookies faxed to me yet......grump. Grump. 8<{

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Marietta, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), December 07, 2000.


hey kritter~!

This piece of meat has a great many possiblities! In these parts, you can sometimes find it for as little as 88 cents a pound, especially at this time of year, tamale making time. What are you in the mood for? If you have a smoker, you can use a dry rub and cold smoke it like a ham, or you can braise it with a delicious brew of either fruit combinations for sweet meat, or a spicy brew of veggies and spices which you can then turn into any number of dishes. Here near the Mexican border, we braise it to DEATH, and then make red chili for Christmas tamales, using the cooking broth for moistening and flavoring the masa. You could use it to make port stew, pork friend rice, the traditional chinese red-roasted pork, stirfrys, eggrolls (if you grind it), wontons. Or, carnitas, stuffed chili rellenos, and don't forget stews! The possibilities are endless! What are you in the mood to do and what does your family like? Give me a clue, and I'll pass ya some of my favorite recipes!!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 08, 2000.


I ended up cooking it in the crockpot, with some receipe from pork.com. The receipe had ketchup{!} and wherstersherstershire sauce, and brown sugar and tons of garlic and onion. Oh My God..it was so good! The meat fell off the bone and everyone raved. :-) I'm hooked on it...never bought it before...but it was on sale so cheap..!

-- kritter (kritter@adelphia.net), December 08, 2000.

Hey krit!

Good move! You can't beat the ease of a crock pot for braising those large pieces of meat with flavorings! Since the recipe is a keeper, why dontcha share it here?? Maybe some of us would like to try it!!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 09, 2000.


Aunt Bee, the treats were a hit! The rum balls were well received, even though they hadn't aged for a week. I thought that the cookies were too sweet, but apparently they were just right for the kids because they were eaten within an hour. Same with the brownies. I passed along the SOAR site url to several of the cooks who were new to the Internet and had never visited it.

The rest of the evening was okay, too. I get along well with my girlfriend's brothers and sisters. We've done things together before, but this was the first gathering where I had spent more than a few minutes with her parents. I think they're disappointed that I'm not an MD, but after I reprogrammed one of the remotes so that it controlled both the VCR and TV, her father warmed up somewhat.

Thanks again for your help!

-- (kb8um8@yahoo.com), December 09, 2000.


Aunt Bee,

We just had some of your cherry vanilla cookies, hot off the sheet. I think Kit wants you to adopt him.

-------------------------------------------------

-- Lon Frank (lgal@exp.net), December 23, 2000.


Hey kb8 and Lon~!

Glad your kitchen experiments were sucessful! And Lon, I would be happy to adopt ANYONE who loves cookies!! I'm glad you fellas liked 'em. Does this mean no fruitcake this year??

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 24, 2000.


Fellow FRLians, Christmas is in the air~! I thought I would revive this thread and see if anyone is in the baking mood! I am trying out biscotti this year, just to see how they are recieved. I'll let ya know! Anyone care to share cookie recipes?

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 01, 2001.

Thank you, thank you.

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Marietta, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), December 01, 2001.

Hey Robert~! I still got yer addy, unless it has changed! I's saving some of those cherry vanilla chips just for you!~

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 01, 2001.

Hi Aunt Bee. :-)

Better Homes and Gardens has some cool recipes on line. Since you're looking at Biscotti, this one is interesting:

Lemon-Pistachio Biscotti

-- Gayla (privacy@please.com), December 01, 2001.


Thank you kindly Gayla! I'll give it shot! I'm still gonna try to make all my Polish cookies this season (very labor intensive, but ever so delicious!) Thanks for checking the web for me, how kind of you! Hugs to you friend, and I'll let ya know how they come out!!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 01, 2001.

Wish I was closer and could help sample them. :-)

Here are some cookies (bars) my dad requests each year at Christmas. They're yummy and not very labor intensive:

Pecan Fingers

3/4 cup shortening (1/2 butter or margarine)

3/4 cup confectioner's sugar

1 1/2 cups flour

2 eggs

1 cup brown sugar

2 tablespoons flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup chopped pecans

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Cream shortening and confectioner's sugar. Blend in 1 1/2 cups flour. Press evenly in bottom of ungreased baking pan. (13"x9"x2") Bake 12 to 15 minutes.

Mix remaining ingredients. Spread over hot baked layer and bake another 20 minutes. Cool, then cut into bars.

-- Gayla (privacy@please.com), December 02, 2001.


Thanks Gayla~! They sound delish! Would that be light brown or dark brown sugar that you use??? As soon as ya tell me, I'll give em a whirl!!!

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), December 02, 2001.

They ARE delish! :-) I use light brown sugar, Aunt Bee. The recipe doesn't say, so it might just be personal preference. When you take them out of the oven, they will be a little 'puffed up' but will flatten as they cool, so don't over-cook. Enjoy!!!

-- Gayla (privacy@please.com), December 02, 2001.

Moderation questions? read the FAQ