Baboon Achievers, Family, Food, holidays, home, Seasons, Uncategorized

Cookie Making Machine

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Normally I spread holiday baking out over a week or so, but this year with Thanksgiving being so late this year along with a work trip next week, I don’t have as much time as usual. So yesterday and today I am a cookie-making machine!

I marked all my recipes in their various books and then went through and made an ingredient list. The shopping went pretty quickly, although I did need to hit two stores.  No Andes Mints or good peanut butter at the first store.  Except for getting our tree on Friday (the only shopping I’m willing to do on Black Friday), I’ve been doing pretty much nothing but measuring, stirring, shaping and baking.  The tins are starting to pile up on the front porch; it’s like having a walk-in freezer.  I don’t know if I’ll get all of them done before my trip, but that’s my goal.  Here is this year’s list:

    • Anna’s Chocolate Chip (yes, our Anna) – using mini red and green candies
    • Pecan Meltaways
    • Vanilla Walnut Crescents
    • Peanut Butter Bon Bons
    • Peanut Butter Blossoms
    • Soft Gingerbread
    • White Chocolate Raspberry Thumbprints
    • Spritz
    • Mint Surprises
    • Derby Cookies
    • Milk Chocolate Fudge
    • Milk Chocolate/PB Fudge

That should keep us in cookies until 2020!

Tell me your very favorite holiday cookie.

50 thoughts on “Cookie Making Machine”

  1. My children and Husband dictate cookie baking favorites, but I draw the line at fussy decorations. I make spritz and Russian Tea Cakes and a thin caramel shortbread called Skibo Castle Crunch. I have a springerle rolling pin and make variety of German/Dutch rolled out cookies that look plain but taste rich.

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  2. i m a shortbread guy
    a pot of tea a plate of shortbread and tcm showing all those movies.
    i could just sit there from now til christmas
    enjoy the convent vs
    it’s on my bucket list
    i was bummed to find the gift exchange will be missed this year
    i’m off to jolly old england friday to visit olivia’s end of travel abroad week of fun before her friends join her to go travel around europe for the holidays
    budapest for christmas on a $13 flight and a stay at the hostel in the holiday spirit
    she performed in the tower of london yesterday living the dream

    oh… dolly partons sugar cookies are to die for

    missing book club and

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    1. missing book club discussion on chris’s book and vs’s shindig will make december only 99% wonderful. i’m bummed but looking forward to london and paris for the pre holiday walkabout

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      1. Will miss you too. With Thanksgiving being so late, it really cuts back on the usable time for the holiday season. But I think holidays in London even on a shoestring will be fabulous.

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  3. Mostly I’m trying to cut back on sweets, but December is really hard. If I make any cookies, it will be my grandma’s kringla. And I might revive the Cardemom Wreaths (yum) which remind me a little of shortbread but, surprisingly, are wreath-shaped, and pretty if you use some green frosting with red candies on them.

    Today I’m making Lime (instead of Lemon) Curd to use up some limes that were on sale.

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  4. I don’t eat cookies, so I’m gonna go OT here. I just took a quiz on the Washington Post, a quiz measuring my ability to “read” cats’ emotion based on short film clips of their faces. I got 7 of 8, qualifying me as a “cat whisperer.” That may not mean much in terms of the Big Picture, but I’ll take it. 🙂

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  5. Christmas cannot happen without krumkake – my nieces wouldn’t let me in the door without some and have now gotten Ms S’ best friend in on the rolling (she’s already asked if she can help again this year). I am also a fan of chocolate crinkles and peanut butter blossoms…but if I make those, I eat them by the armload, so try to only make one or the other, depending on Ms S’ mood.

    This year I am attempting a kransekake for my mother’s birthday, which comes right before Christmas. I have made a practice set of rings today and can see where I need to up my game. They are currently cooling so won’t see how wobbly my tower is for a bit yet.

    Glad to see the Anna chocolate chip cookies make the grade. 🙂

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      2. Recipe I am using doesn’t use marzipan – it’s half and half ground almonds and almond flour. The downside is you have to hand-grind the almonds so you don’t accidentally get almond paste/marzipan starter. 🙂

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  6. I don’t make cookies just because it’s Christmas or any other holiday. But I’m glad other people do because I love to eat them!

    I’ve been thinking about my Amish Friendship bread and when to start baking that. I’m going to wait about a week yet. I have to get through Holiday concerts at the college and opening ‘Santaland Diaries’ at the Civic Theater (both open the sometime which is either good or bad depending how you want to look at it.)*
    Show opens 12/13 and Concert dress rehearsal is 12/12 with concerts 13 and 14.
    So I’ll wait about a week or so then get the starter out. That first week I just have to stir it up. I predict I’ll have the energy for that. 🙂
    Not to mention winding up Econ class. Just took the second to last quiz. Should have had 100% and I made dumb mistakes (and I even double checked!!) Got 94%. Sheez. Dope slapped myself.

    *I did this to myself. I knew they were the same week. But I already have a head start on Santaland so once into tech for that I can really just focus on my Holiday concert lighting.
    And I know the actor and director doing Santaland and I really wanted to work with them so I willingly did this.
    If you don’t hear from me a few days from now, that’s why. 🙂

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    1. ever since linda suggested sourdough for our bookclub selection i have been itching to get started on the sourdough path but it is a daily commitment and i suck in that aspect of the equation so we will see.
      there are gluten free sourdough starters too and i would love to reintroduce bread to my life and not get my butt kicked.
      thanksgiving prep had bread jumping into my mouth until i had the gluten gremlins sent me into a zombieland trance on the couch for an extended stretch.
      friendship bread is a wonderfull thing. debbie used to take it to work and be everyones highlight of the week on an ongoing basis. great tradition

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      1. I remember when Clyde started doing the artists in bread. I checked out the book and I love the idea but it’s just way too much daily commitment like the sourdough. And only two of us here for all that bread.

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        4. i bought the gluten free artisan bread book and it’s not great bread but i should keep trying

          clyde said it was good but he is a better baker than i am

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  7. We are seeing the New York Black and White cookies all over here. I forgot about krumkake . I will make those, too, as well as some German cookies-Lebkuchen, Zimsterne and Anise cookies.

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  8. My favorite Christmas cookies are Mexican swizzle sticks. A chocolate flavored Spritz cookie with I believe the cinnamon in them frosted with chocolate icing and sprinkles with multicolored sprinkles. I also have a friend whose almond macaroons won the star Tribune cookie baking contest one year. I made those last year. Even though I didn’t get the shape quite right, The flavor was outstanding.

    Chris in O-town (actually, I am in Mankato at the GSR fine art festival. Had a brush with greatness. Craig Blacklock’s booth is about 10 feet from mine and he introduced himself to me. Photographer extraordinaire, as was his dad, Les. The festivals open tomorrow from 10 to 4 if anybody wants to come down and meet him and buy one of his pieces of photography or say hi to me. 😀)

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      1. craig is a friend of mine.
        he is an artist who figured out how to roll with the world as it morphed into its new self.
        craig and les used to do the calendars at b dalton in an ever expanding way. first minnesota then the southwest then the other 15 categories that popped out of their camera’s. then les died and so did b dalton and craig came out with his first book and his second and one year i gave my mom all craigs books and it was so wonderful to see his eye as it morphed into its mature wonderful self. that may have been 20 years ago and i have seen craigs stuff since then and it keeps getting stornger.

        if you see this before your day is done tomorrow say hey to him for me. he and joe havel sculptor and former bass player and i used to hang out at craigs house on the corner of 169 and 494 before they were freeways
        they and and mara adimintz scrupe (poet extrordinaire) are my art friends.
        artists are different people.
        writers are different people
        bloggers are different people.

        say hi to craig for me.
        maybe i can sneak away to mankato tomorrow. that would be a kick.
        i have a cople other things on the docket but ill see what i can do.

        congrats chris on being there as an award winning writer.
        i remember the day you told us you were going to write 50,000 words for some contest discipline thing and it turned into your life.

        nice job man

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        1. My wasband and I were invited to Les and Fran’s home in rural Moose Lake 40 years ago. They were so gracious and interesting. It was a wonderful afternoon.

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        2. that must have been shortly after they moved up there from eden prairie

          i did get down to see chris and craig today and craig mentioned that he hiked back into the spot where his house was all those years ago and the only thing he could recognize were some very large trees where his dad had planted seedlings way back when

          i thought craig had figured out how to do the photography and online sales based world of commerce but it looks like he and i may get to work together on a project or two

          thanks chris

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    4. coconut macaroon recipe please ( its times like these when i wish we had that little side column of recipes and poems and started one on music and books)
      in my next life i will be organized and handle all this for myself. its not magic just not anything that comes naturally

      coconut macaroons are the best cookies i never eat. maybe three times in my life but i get a mouth watering saliva dump just thinking about them

      oh and truffles ( the chocolate not the mushroom… well maybe the mushroom… its on my bucket list but the chocolate with raspberry makes my mouth water too

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      1. Tim are you talking about the Kitchen Congress? It’s still there. But if you’re using the app on your phone it’s way way way way way at the bottom

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        1. i don’t remember submitting the contributions i am credited for and can’t find the one i thought was there

          thanks vs i will go back there and try some of these

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      3. Yes, tim. BiR’s research is correct. She posted the macaroon recipe i was referring to. Simplest to copy and paste that if you want to make them. The baker, Beth Jones, told me to not stress too much over the shape. They can be flat (easier to do). The Strib staff wanted them to look pretty for the cameral so they made them into much more rounded half-spheres. It’s all about the flavors with this cookie, not the looks.

        Chris

        And a shoutout to tim for driving down to Mankato to see me and his buddy Craig Blacklock. I always appreciate a visit from a TBer. 🙂 (A highlight of my day. The GSR Festival is pretty classy. If you like fine art and photography like Craig Blacklock’s (and a few authors!) put it on your schedule for next year–the Sat. and Sunday after Thanksgiving.)

        C

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  10. My favorite cookies are spritz, a very simple recipe with just butter, sugar, eggs, flour, and almond extract. They’re very plain, but the texture is perfect, and the smell of almond extract always reminds me of Christmas. I could eat a couple dozen of them at a time.

    Does anyone have ljb’s recipe for the chocolate cherry amaretto cookies? I thought it might be in Kitchen Congress, but I’m not finding it there.

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  11. Rise and Shine Baboons,

    My very favorites are the white, shortbread balls called so many names:

    White Mice
    Russian Tea Cakes
    Pecan Sandies
    And more than those—it is too early to think of them all

    I also love thumbprint cookies and shortbread in any form.

    The only ones I make are for my mother. Cookies are my gift to her, no matter what the holiday. I make Peanut Blossom Cookies, bag them two to a bag, then freeze them. My sister and niece take them to my mother three times per week on their visits.

    We arrived back in town Friday evening with no travel drama. The trip down was a bit more fraught, but we arrived safely in Central Iowa. We had a wonderful day which was cookie-less but full of pies:

    Pumpkin
    Minced meat
    Apple
    Cherry

    And no one talked politics or religion for which I was grateful.

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    1. I have a deeply held conviction that Peanut Butter Blossoms should be made with chocolate stars. Most people make them with Hershey’s kisses, which are not the proper shape. They fall off the cookie when you take a bite. Stars stay in place.

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      1. I’ve never had trouble with the kisses falling off. Do you stick them on right after they come out of the oven? And then I put them right away into the fridge or the freezer to harden up so the little bitty melted part at the bottom hardens up and sticks on. At least that’s how it usually works for me.

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  12. One of our lost Christmas traditions was going to one of Kelly’s aunts and uncles for Christmas Eve. She made lots of cookies and a cheesy dip that had to be terribly unhealthy but sure was good to eat.
    I always looked forward to the cookies and dip. And punch.
    I don’t know what the cookies were. Green ones, the white puffy ones, and my favorite was a chocolate caramel brownie sort of thing. Lots of others. And oyster stew but I would only eat the crackers.
    Which reminds me that my folks and relatives from my side used to get together for oyster stew.
    You don’t hear much about oyster stew anymore.

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    1. I do think there is a reason why you don’t hear much about Oyster Stew—I always found it kind of yucky. It was the Christmas Eve meal which my dad just loved and enjoyed. We had to swallow the oysters whole. I replaced it with a Seafood Stew that I find delicious.

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      1. Oyster stew was a specialty of my Dad. Service organizations in town would have him make it for their Christmad parties. He was relaly particular about the oysters, and would get them by the gallon.

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  13. Late on a Sunday, nothing is really off-topic, right? I just discovered an astonishing comic talent, British ventriloquist Nina Conti. Most of her skits are too profane for this space, but this one’s safe enough. Her puppet monkey experiments by hypnotizing the person controlling him. Pretty amazing stuff.

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