Nothing I know of says home for the holidays like all the foods that are associated with the holidays. There is something about the smells in the kitchen that says everything is right with the world.
Cookies are great for this. Not only do
they produce all those wonderful smells but they make for great gifts. I'd like to
share with you a couple of my recipes and some of my hints.
Cutout cookies just seem to be a part of the season but often look prettier than they taste. If they do taste good, they seem to lose their shape in the oven. After many recipes, this one given to me by my good friend Jeanne won raves in the taste department but were a bit difficult to work with. I messed with them and here is what I came up with. Still great tasting but easier to work with. Still, simple cutter shapes work better.
5 |
Cups |
Flour |
2 |
teaspoons |
Baking Powder |
2 |
teaspoons |
Salt |
2 |
teaspoons |
Baking Soda |
1 |
teaspoon |
Nutmeg |
1 |
Cup |
Butter |
2 |
Cups |
Sugar |
2 |
Large |
Eggs |
1 |
teaspoon |
Vanilla |
1 |
Cup |
Sour Cream |
1. Mix the flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda, and nutmeg together in a medium bowl and set aside.
2. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar until the mixture in very light. Mix in the eggs and vanilla. Add the flour mixture and the sour cream and mix just until blended. If the mixture is too soft, add up to one cup more of flour.
3. Chill the mixture in the refrigerator for at least two hours but overnight is better. The mixture may be held up to a week at this point.
4. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Lightly grease cookie sheets.
5. Remove part of the dough from the refrigerator leaving the rest chilled and roll out on a floured surface. Cut in desired shapes and place the cookies on the prepared cookie sheets.
6. Bake for 6 minutes or until the edges just begin to brown. Remove the cookies from the pans and cool completely on wire racks.
This is a very different cookie that my mother used to make. She got the recipe from her best friend, Phil. I know that they are time consuming and I've never had them float but I make them every year and love them. It is the only time I make them. The original recipe calls for lard rather than butter. I have also used butter flavored Crisco in these which makes for a much softer dough.
| 7 | Cups | Flour |
| 2 | Packages | Yeast |
| 1½ | teaspoons | Salt |
| 1 | pound | Butter |
| 4 | Large | Eggs |
| 1/3 | Cups | Milk |
| 1 | Cup | Sugar |
| 1 | Pound | Ground Nuts |
1. Mix the flour, lard or butter, salt, and yeast like pie dough. Make a hole in the middle of the dough. Mix the eggs and milk together. Pour this into the hole in the flour mixture. Knead the dough until smooth. Put the dough into a white pillowcase and tie a knot in the top. Put in slightly warm water for about 2 hours. It is ready when it floats on top. (As I said, it has never floated for me and it never floated for my mother but you still need to do this step.)
2. Filling: Stir together the 1 cup sugar and the nuts. Half the amount is really enough to fill all the dough.
3. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease cookie sheets or use parchment paper.
4. Roll the dough out on a surface sprinkled with sugar. Roll in a circle and cut in wedges. Put a teaspoon of filling on each wedge and roll up starting from the wide end. Place the cookies on the cookie sheet.
5. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes until lightly browned.
Note: I have created another filling for these that my family loves. Make a cheese filling adding an egg and sugar to taste to 8 ounces of cream cheese. Roll out the dough as for cinnamon rolls. Spread the cheese filling on and then spread raspberry spreadable fruit on top. Roll the dough up like you would for cinnamon rolls and slice the cookies off placing on a cookie sheet.
Here is a hint for all cookies, parchment paper is wonderful and I'll never know why I didn't try it before. Cookies come right off the pan and it saves on cleanup.
Hope you enjoy these recipes and they help you go home.