Family favourites (old and new)
My friend and fellow dance mom Annabel makes an amazingly yummy Tuscan salad. But her recipe calls for grape tomatoes. Sadly, I didn’t have any BUT I did have a pomegranate so I thought I’d see how that worked out. Turns out it works out …
Rosemary ran the Queen’s University daycare back in the day and I was part of the first graduating class. Having recently immigrated to Canada from the UK I thought Rosemary had the most enchanting accent (ever) and I would do my very best to speak …
My Dad’s side of the family is Scottish so I decided to make a couple different kinds of shortbread this year. I did up a traditional Scottish shortbread which is basically butter, brown sugar and flour and a whipped shortbread which is butter (again), confectioner’s sugar and flour. Easy and rich.
Thanks to allrecipes.com for the Scottish Shortbread IV recipe and the Whipped Shortbread Cookies recipe. I decided to make the Scottish Shortbread a bit more festive by dipping one end in chocolate and sprinkling it with crushed candy canes while the chocolate was still warm. I added chocolate chips to the Whipped Shortbread because who doesn’t like a hit of chocolate with their shortbread. If you don’t…leave off the chips. The chips were supposed to be the eyes and mouth of singing carolers but they ended up looking more like the ghost of Christmas Past at at least a couple look more like the buttons on a snowman. Oh well.
For the Scottish Shortbread next time I would make them thinner so they are closer to 1 x 3. Mine turned out a tad more rustic than I would have liked. I also over cooked the Whipped Shortbread just a tad. I think they should be less brown around the edges. However, despite these minor glitches they were both yummy and received the household cookie connoisseurs’ seal of approval. Of the two of them the Scottish Shortbread dough is easier to handle so that’s probably the one I’ll make again. The Whipped Shortbread requires fiddling with two spoons to get the batter onto the baking sheet.
We’ll see whether they garner sufficient points to become holiday standards.
After a full day of baking I guess we are having cookies for dinner.
These are my friend Laura’s famous Christmas Tree Cookies. I forgot to write out the recipe and in truth they are super fiddley to make (even Laura says so). They are basically a linzer cookie (hazelnut cookie) filled with raspberry jam. I don’t know that …
I make this recipe every holiday season. My kids love them and this recipe makes a tonne of cookies that freeze really well. In fact, they are great straight out of the freezer. My friend Stacy gave me the original base recipe and my friend …
This recipe comes via my good friend Laura’s kitchen (she makes very yummy things). It was one of the recipes we made on our cookie day. These are lovely, savoury bite sized pieces that melt in your mouth. They require restraint lest you have a Cookie Monster moment. I am eating them for breakfast as I write and since the kids are still in bed…there is no one to stop me mwa ha ha.
Makes 4 dozen.
They are fabulous and Laura says they pair nicely with Prosecco…we were drinking mulled wine and I thought they paired pretty well with that too thank you very much and thank you Laura. I think baking day needs to become an annual tradition.
I had a baking day with my friend Laura yesterday. Ok so it was a baking, mulled wine and cheese and crackers day. The base recipe is from Julee Rosso’s classic, Great Good Food. I thought it would be good with toasted almonds and dried …
This is another recipe from the Woman’s Home Companion Cook Book. It was quite tasty with good ol’ fish sticks so I thought I’d share it. Ingredients: 3/4 c. Mayo 1 large finely chopped pickle 2 Tbsp finely chopped capers 1 Tbsp finely chopped parsley …
So…apparently only the bunny hill was open at Grouse Mountain on Friday so the girls decided they’d do some Christmas baking (aka destroying my kitchen). But, who am I to discourage the making of goodies. First up…Gingerbread with Caramel Sauce.
The Gingerbread recipe came from my 1950s copy of The Women’s Home Companion Cook Book. Nostalgia kicks in about now because it happens to have thee best peanut butter cookie recipe EVER (or the dough was good anyway…my Mom and I never managed to bake more than about a dozen), my Dad’s trusty egg nog recipe, and a really good spice cake recipe. It also happens to have a hilarious section on entertaining and the service of dinners with helpful “Without a Maid” and “With a Maid” tips. Oh thank goodness!…I wouldn’t have had a clue.
Gingerbread:
2 c. flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1 1/4 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/3 c. butter (it called for shortening but I hate shortening so I made them use butter)
1/2 c. white sugar
1 egg
2/3 c. cooking molasses
3/4 c. buttermilk
Preheat oven to 350 F.
Sift the flour, measure. Add baking powder, soda, salt, and spices; sift again (me I wouldn’t have bothered but they did).
Cream the butter, add sugar gradually, cream together until light and fluffy.
Add well-beaten egg, beat thoroughly and add molasses.
Add dry ingredients alternating with the buttermilk, stirring only enough after each addition to blend thoroughly.
Pour into greased 8 x 8 pan
Bake about 50 minutes.
The caramel sauce came from The Pioneer Woman (Ree Drummond’s) Easy Caramel Sauce courtesy of the food network. It got 5 stars…let’s see whether it withstands the novice baker test. I kind of hope so because I love caramel sauce.
So the cake was a bit dry and very strong in taste but the caramel sauce is fabulous. The solution is obviously to smother the cake in caramel sauce…easy.
My daughter loves Chinese green onion pancakes. She particularly likes the ones her friend Steph’s Mom Cathy makes. Cathy graciously shared her recipe with me and I made them tonight. They were delicious. Thank you Cathy! Ingredients: 2 eggs 1/4 c. water 1/4 c. flour …