2024 Chistmas Cookies - it's that time again!

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Ok, I made four cookie doughs:
Chocolate chip and macadamia nut
Chocolate, white chocolate chip, and macadamia nut
Peanut butter
Gingerbread

Hopefully DD will help me bake them. If not, they go in the freezer.

I also want to make peppermint bark. That gets done with the microwave.
 
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@Aunt Bea I miss my grandmother's fruitcake! She would start them in September. Like her mac-n-cheese recipe, she took the fruitcake recipe with her. For both, I have a list of ingredients without measurements or instructions.
so . . . how big is the list?
I bake an ancient recipe that has ka-billions of stuff - solotta' people opine "all that????"

I'm with your grandmother - Sept/Oct is 'making time' -
December to March-April is "eating" time . . .
 
Every year I make short bread (mostly to give away). This year, I made about 25 boxes - each box is about a pound. Potato stamp art on the boxes because playing with paint is fun. The short bread is laced with ground cardamon, lemon rind and ginger and a few batches also had chopped dried cranberries.

cookies_2024.jpg


I also made a batch of GF shortbread dough and froze it in logs - a gift for a friend who doesn't do flower. I had to mess with a recipe I found online to make the texture come out a little better - adding some corn flour along with the called for almond flour and upping the butter quotient.

This week, I sadly am also going to make some peanut butter cookies for my DH. He believes that this is the only holiday cookie worth eating, and thinks that the ones with the fork marks on the top taste best.
 
so . . . how big is the list?
I bake an ancient recipe that has ka-billions of stuff - solotta' people opine "all that????"

I'm with your grandmother - Sept/Oct is 'making time' -
December to March-April is "eating" time . . .
Really, REALLY big. Do you have a great recipe to share??? I've not had a good fruitcake since 1981.

Every year I make short bread (mostly to give away). This year, I made about 25 boxes - each box is about a pound. Potato stamp art on the boxes because playing with paint is fun. The short bread is laced with ground cardamon, lemon rind and ginger and a few batches also had chopped dried cranberries.

View attachment 72014

I also made a batch of GF shortbread dough and froze it in logs - a gift for a friend who doesn't do flower. I had to mess with a recipe I found online to make the texture come out a little better - adding some corn flour along with the called for almond flour and upping the butter quotient.

This week, I sadly am also going to make some peanut butter cookies for my DH. He believes that this is the only holiday cookie worth eating, and thinks that the ones with the fork marks on the top taste best.
Every year? And yet not once has one of these potato-stamped boxes arrived at our door. :glare:

Never have I ever made actual Christmas cookies beyond store-bought "cut and roll" kinds. Perhaps a bar cookie long ago, but y'all inspired me. So I spent the last couple days making cookies and now...I have a passel of cookies. I'll be boxing them out to neighbors and friends over the next few days....starting with Frank's office peeps. I only made five cookies: A pistachio cookie with browned butter icing, a hot chocolate cookie, a Neapolitan cookie, Thumbprint cookies, and snickerdoodles. Here are all in a tray for Frank to take to work tomorrow. I got the recipes from a popular website called S*lly's B*king *ddiction. I had never made any of them before....but her directions are good. Regardless...baking is hard. I measured everything....

cookies.jpg
 
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I made the last 5 recipes today I had on my list - the 3 types of snickerdoodles, which are always the messiest, since they are made in the mixer. I was apprehensive about using that mixer - the first time I used it for several recipes in a row, after I did that "tune-up" on it a few weeks ago, and it didn't slow down at all, and didn't heat up much, after the 5 recipes in quick succession. The star anise one I saved for last, so I didn't have to clean the mixer, in between batches. Baking soon...
5 recipes of snickerdoodles, 2 CC oatmeal, 2 cream cheese, and one star anise. by pepperhead212, on Flickr
 
this is from the 1920's:

old timey fruitcake
this I've been doing on and off since the late seventies.
it is very flexible with regard to what kinds of fruits and nuts you want to use.
makes about 11 to 12 pounds of cakes in whatever shapes you choose.

the fruit
chop and macerate the dried fruit - use candied or glazed
1 cup each:
pineapple
apricot
dates
2 cups cherries
2.5 cups golden raisins
2.5 cups regular raisins
0.5 cup currants
(I prefer to make fresh) 0.5 cup each
candied lemon peel
candied orange peel

bring slowly to a simmer in a heavy pot adding in total 2-2.5 cups of liquid:
apricot nectar
booze of choice - brandy / whiskey / bourbon / rum are the usual suspects
simmer 10 minutes; allow to stand overnight not refrigerated
should not have free liquid - some heavy syrup okay - but if you push the fruit to one side no juice should “run out” of the mix - if too liquid, reduce over low heat and allow to thoroughly cool - overnight to 48 hr - before use.

the nuts - I prefer unsalted where available
3 cups rough chopped pecans
1 cup rough chopped macadamia
2 cups rough chopped cashews
1 cup roasted sunflower seeds

the batter
6 cups sifted (780 gr) AP flour
of the six cups reserve 1 cup AP flour
sift / mix into remaining 5 cups
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp nutmeg
0.5 tsp ground clove
0.25 tsp cardamom
2 tsp cinnamon
0.5 tsp baking soda
2 tsp salt

cream one pound butter with two cups white granulated sugar
add ten whole large eggs
add 1.5 tablespoon vanilla
slowly add in flour and mix until smooth

in a really really big bowl - mine is barely adequate at 12” diameter
add nuts to batter
add reserved cup of flour and mix in well

add scoops of fruit & fold into batter -
I use the fold technique as “stirring” is hardly possible

butter two ten inch tube pans
I _always_ use wax paper on the bottom!
split the mix between the pans - I just use a big spatula to scoop into pans
tap to get out any entrapped air pockets

bake at 300’F for 3 - 3.5 hrs - clean tooth pick routine although I use a wooden skewer to get to the middles.

remove from oven - allow to stand on rack in pans for 30 minutes
do not shortchange the cooling period - the cakes can easily break apart if handled when still too warm.
invert and hope they fall out nicely - if not knife down the sides to release.

the cake on the right has a simple syrup glaze with deco pecans; brought to soft ball (295’F)
it has problems. the glaze is sticky - cheese cloth & wax paper stick excessively to glaze.
I’ve hit it with powder sugar - we’ll see.
not a recommended glaze finish.

the cake on the left is happier.

1734446597872.jpeg
 
So I spent the last couple days making cookies and now...I have a passel of cookies. I'll be boxing them out to neighbors and friends over the next few days....starting with Frank's office peeps. I only made five cookies: A pistachio cookie with browned butter icing, a hot chocolate cookie, a Neapolitan cookie, Thumbprint cookies, and snickerdoodles. Here are all in a tray for Frank to take to work tomorrow. I got the recipes from a popular website called S*lly's B*king *ddiction. I had never made any of them before....but her directions are good. Regardless...baking is hard. I measured everything....

View attachment 72015
Love those stripey Neapolitan Cookies; great idea!. How did they turn out/taste?
 
@dcSaute Thank you! It's a similar list of ingredients! Mine calls for blackberry jam, and the alcohol used is "green-label apple jack brandy". I don't have the nectar in the list. How much alcohol is used when bringing to a simmer? I am snipping your recipe! Your fruit cakes look great!!!

@Janet H I really enjoyed them! The recipe suggested adding extract, and I feel that added a lot of flavor to the strawberry. I think she mentioned an option of adding some freeze-dried strawberries. If I make them again, I'll try that. The flavors were all good and very distinct.
 
@dcSaute Thank you! It's a similar list of ingredients! Mine calls for blackberry jam, and the alcohol used is "green-label apple jack brandy". I don't have the nectar in the list. How much alcohol is used when bringing to a simmer? I am snipping your recipe! Your fruit cakes look great!!!

~1 cup of brandy or bourbon. rum is too strong for my tastes, my preferences is brandy....
 
~1 cup of brandy or bourbon. rum is too strong for my tastes, my preferences is brandy....
Thank you so much for taking the time to put this on paper! :heart:

One last question, do you put any additional booze over it while it "sets?"
 
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When I used to make fruitcake for certain people, brandy was always my favorite alcohol in it, or, something made with brandy, Grand Marnier, the absolute best in them.

I baked 11 of those cookie logs today - I saved the 6 chocolate and 3 habanero gingersnaps for tomorrow, and the 5 snickerdoodles for Saturday.
Some of the first of 11 recipes of cookies baked, 12-19. I have to put some away in the tins, before baking the last two recipes. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

The last of those two recipes, the barley icebox cookies, that are almost like toffee, once cooled. by pepperhead212, on Flickr
 
One last question, do you put any additional booze over it while it "sets?"

no - I've found it 'not hard' to over-do the boozy aspect . . .
which I have done,,,, not a good thing.

I do make a 'hard sauce' to go with it - which is just powdered sugar and brandy.
 
Today, I finished the cookies, all the snickerdoodles, which I had to roll into balls, flatten slightly, and toss in the cinnamon sugar mix, before lining up on the sheets. The cream cheese snickerdoodles were the stickiest, as usual, even though I added a little more flour, than usual. The oatmeal version was hard, as usual, and I didn't have to wash my hands, except when I had to remove the sheets from the oven. And I don't know why those star anise snickerdoodles flattened - it wasn't sticky at all, and I weighed the flour, which normally, if anything, adds a little more.
The single recipe of the Star Anise snickerdoodles, which, for some reason, flattened, when baked. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

The 2 batches of Cream Cheese snickerdoodles. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

The 2 batches of CC Oatmeal Snickerdoodles. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

And here's something else I did, before cleaning up - I milled some rye flour, so I can start baking some more rye bread.
A little over 5 lbs of rye flour, milled before cleaning up after all those cookies. Now I can make some more bread! by pepperhead212, on Flickr
 

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