For some reason, Christmas crept quietly into view after being a speck on the horizon for months. Suddenly, shopping needed doing, Thanksgiving took out a chunk of time and the supply of Christmas cookies tucked away for snacking and unexpected guests wasn’t in existence.
I posted a help for the Christmas baking, last year, called Christmas Cookies – The Twelve Days of Christmas in Three. In the post I outlined a time table for actually having a nice supply of goodies on hand without too much kitchen-time trauma on your part. I even used recipes that could be used with gluten-free flours. So, if you want to get your home smelling like Christmas, you can look it up and be elected Mom of the Season for 2017!
I got a day of baking done yesterday. With only one of my three children still at home, my list was shorter this year. Too bad for the other three offspring. I don’t mail cookies! You want cookies, you come home. Anyway, my list this year was:
Peanut Butter Cookies. I like to add a touch of orange extract in with the vanilla in my recipe.
Lebkuchen Bars. This is a German cookie recipe that I developed to match what I remember from my mother’s baking and treats sent to us for Christmas. I soak the chopped, dried fruit in the refrigerator in brandy for three months before Christmas.
Cinnamon Cookies. This was a new recipe I tried this year. It is a crispy drop cookies with cinnamon in the dough and rolled in more cinnamon before baking. Tastes like a dainty version of a Snickerdoodle cookie.
Chocolate Chip Cookies. These are big, fat chewy versions with an overabundance of chocolate chips . . . as that were possible.
Cinnamon Sour Cream Twists. These are the decadent ones. The dough is enriched with a good amount of sour cream and eggs. The dough isn’t sweetened because it is rolled out in a cinnamon/sugar mixture, folded over, more sugar until you can see layers. One, more rolling and folding and you cut strips which you twist a bit when you bake them. I always use parchment paper for baking but with the amount of sugar and fat in this cookie, it is a must that will save you a lot of clean up.
Russian Tea Cake. Cookies also known as Snowball Cookies, Mexican Tea Cakes, and probably a lot of other names I haven’t heard of yet. I always use walnuts in these along with some orange zest.
Amish Sugar Cookies. Now, these are a favorite as they are delicate yet don’t crumble. There is oil and butter in this recipe so not exactly dietetic.
Crazy Quilts, Catholics & Cookies 