Cookie swap!

[Kam]

SNOWBALLS

INGREDIENTS
1 cup butter
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup chopped pecans
1/3 cup confectioners' sugar for decoration
1/4 cup finely crushed peppermint candy canes

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
Cream the butter with 1/2 cup of the confectioners' sugar and the vanilla. Mix in the flour, nuts and salt. Roll about 1 tablespoon or so of dough into balls and place on an ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 15 minutes. Do not allow these cookies to get too brown. It's better to undercook them than to overcook them. While cookies are still hot roll them in confectioners' sugar. Once they have cooled roll them in confectioners' sugar once more. Variation: add some finely crushed candy canes to the confectioners' sugar used for the final dusting.

[Kam]

Man, I am going home and making butter cookies tonight

[miss puff]

Oh man, I remember one Christmas where I made chocolate eclairs, strawberry cream puffs, chocolate truffles, five cheese cakes, three pumpkin pies, a gingerbread house, banana bread, zucchini bread AND a couple dozen of cookies! I barely had enough energy to prepare the meal for Christmas!

Are you inviting guests? I would like to go to YOUR house for christmas!

Thanks for the snowball recipe. I think it's the snowball and not the tea cakes because the snowball calls for vanilla. I think my grandma put almond flavor in there too. I will be baking this weekend.

[jane taylor]

Party at Kam's house

Here's a recipe I've enjoyed this fall:

White Chocolate Dipped Oatmeal Craisin Cookies

2 sticks butter (no substitution)
3/4 c. granulated sugar
3/4 c. brown sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
3 c. quick-cooking oats
1 tsp. vanilla
1 c. (or a little more) Craisins
White chocolate bark

Cream butter and sugars. Add eggs and mix well. Combine salt, baking soda, and flour. Add to creamed mixture. Add oats, making sure they are mixed in well. Fold in Craisins. Drop by teaspoonfuls on baking sheet or baking stone. Bake at 350 degrees for 11-14 minutes. "Dunk" cookies in melted white chocolate. (Be careful and don't burn yourself ) Allow to cool.

These are really pretty cookies and are so good!

[InLimbo]

bump! c'mon every1 time for your favorite recipes

[lilgoose]

Kudos to InLimbo!!!!

What a wonderful way to boost the spirits! Some of these sound really great and we had decided to do some homemade goodies for Christmas gifts this year.....I am going to have to get more ink for my printer now!

lrprn: Is this sugar cookies made from powdered sugar better than from flour? I have never heard of them being made this way and they sure sound good!

My contribution to the swap is one cookie recipe, one eat by the small handfulls and one desert that was my Grandma's.....


Chocolate Krinkles

350 degrees 10 minutes

1 1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup oil
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
3 eggs
1 2/3 cup flour
1/2 cup cocoa
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/3 to 1/2 cup powdered sugar

Combine sugar, oil and vanilla. Mix Well. Add eggs one at a time. Mix well. Stir in flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt. Cover and refrigerate for 3 hours. Roll into balls. roll in powdered sugar. Bake 10 mins on greased cookie sheet.



This one my son asks for every year!

Puppy Chow

1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup peanut butter
9 cups rice chex cereal
2 cups powdered sugar
2 cups mixed nuts
(alternate recipe~~8 cups cereal and 1 cup small pretzels)

Melt chocolate, butter and peanut butter. Pour over cereal and nuts. Gently toss until well coated. Put powdered sugar in a large bag, add cereal and shake until coated. Store airtight.



And, my favorite Christmas food:

I use a 9 x 11 glass baking dish and double this as it is sooo great for family gatherings. Reserve some of the "crust" to sprinkle on top. Also, you can use other pie toppings if cherries aren't your thing....Dream Whip is still available in the baking isle.

Cherry Delight

Combine: 1/4 lb. butter, melted
2 Tbsp. sugar
2 cups Graham er crumbs
Mix well and press into a 6 x 10 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Cool.

Mix: one 8 oz. package Cream Cheese at room temp.
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup powdered sugar

Add to by gently folding into 1 package prepared Dream Whip.

Spread evenly on graham er crust. Let chill for 1 hour or until firm. Top with Thank You brand Cherry Pie Filling (there is one that has more fruit....this is the one I like best, but your store brand would be fine also)

[SinkingFast]

OK,...........

I'm not much on making cookies.

It has to do with 8th grade Home Ec, and being the class that baked cookies for every little school do. Parent/Teacher Conferences, Beta Club inititation, the Superintendent is coming, you name it. Our class baked and baked and baked COOKIES.

My group drew Pecan Sandies for our class project and that's the cookie we baked a ton of. I got to where I HATED those cookies. Burned out on baking cookies in general.

So how about a Salad??!!

My kids call this Fruit Salad, but it's really a type of 5 cup salad.

One 8 oz pkg cream cheese softened.
One tub of Cool Whip, thawed.
Sugar to sweeten to taste.
One jar marachino cherries, drained, rinsed, dried on paper towel, and cut in half.
One generous cup of chopped pecans. Fine or course, whichever you like.
About half a large bag of mini marshmallows.
One can (15-16 oz ?) of pineapple tidbits. Drain. Reserve the juice.

Cream the softened Cream Cheese using pineapple juice. I tend to make it a bit thin. The marshmallows will draw up liquid later and make the "salad" drier.

Add sugar to your personal taste. I believe the original recipe called for 1/4 cup of sugar, but I found it really depends on the pineapple juice you get. Could be less. Could be more.

Gently fold in the Cool Whip, mixing well.

Fold in the nuts, cherries, and pineapple, stir gently to evenly distribute.

Fold in about half a bag of the mini marshmallows. Stir gently to evenly distribute.

Makes one large bowl full of "Fruit Salad".

Keep refrigerated.

Lasts maybe 2 days at my house. It's a holiday only dish, so it disappears quickly with my crew.

If you have a diabetic in the family, you can easily substitute Splenda for sugar and use the Sugar Free Cool Whip. I've done that for family members and the salad came out great.

Need to lower fat??!! Substitute the low fat Cream Cheese. Gives a bit different flavor, but still good, none the less.

[lrprn]

Great recipes, lilgoose! Thanks for sharing!

You asked:

lrprn: Is this sugar cookies made from powdered sugar better than from flour? I have never heard of them being made this way and they sure sound good!

These sugar cookies are incredibly light and so tasty on their own, you don't need frosting! My family's favorite way to eat them is to sandwich two cookies rolled a little thinner than normal then cut into circles, then baked for a few fewer minutes until the edges are just about to turn light brown. Remove from cookie pan and cool on wire rack or newspaper. When cool, spread a teaspoon or so of raspberry jelly or green apple jelly on one, then "glue" the two halves together. If you really want to be fancy, cut the center out of one of the circles before baking, then when you glue the cookies together, the red or green shows through the small cut-out in the upper cookie. They are deeeee-lic-ious!!

[lrprn]

OK,...........I'm not much on making cookies.

Who cares??!! This sounds like a wonderful recipe and I'm going to see how my family likes it this holiday. Thanks for sharing!

[lilgoose]

Great recipes, lilgoose! Thanks for sharing!

You asked:


These sugar cookies are incredibly light and so tasty on their own, you don't need frosting! My family's favorite way to eat them is to sandwich two cookies rolled a little thinner than normal then cut into circles, then baked for a few fewer minutes until the edges are just about to turn light brown. Remove from cookie pan and cool on wire rack or newspaper. When cool, spread a teaspoon or so of raspberry jelly or green apple jelly on one, then "glue" the two halves together. If you really want to be fancy, cut the center out of one of the circles before baking, then when you glue the cookies together, the red or green shows through the small cut-out in the upper cookie. They are deeeee-lic-ious!!

GOT INK~WILL PRINT!!

Sounds like you could put ANYTHING in the middle and just feel so indulgent!

Just found out that I get to have DH's family for a Christmas afternoon get together and these sound like something the kids and I will enjoy doing on Friday before.

Don't remember, but are these freezable?

The salad sounds REALLY good, but the men in my life are opposed to cherries (and the one is afraid of pineapples), which is why I said any fruit topping would work on the Cherry Delight~he likes the strawberries on his.

I am thinking that even the Snowballs would be a great and fun one to make.

My sister-in-law gets orders starting before Thanksgiving for Pumpkin Rolls and she sells them for $10 a roll. A couple of years ago, she made over 200 rolls between Thanksgiving and Christmas! This is all word of mouth and from people she knows or who knows them.

The other sister-in-law makes the rolls and also makes fudge and sells the heck out of them~different areas and no competition for each other. One year, her and her daughter made over $1500 just making these two things......

MORE POWER TO 'EM!! I don't think I could stand that! Even 30 dozen sounds a little too overwhelming and I don't work outside the house.....

MERRY CHRISTMAS to all!!!

[lilgoose]

[QUOTE=lrprn;71215]

Here's one of my favorite cookie recipes that my family asks for every year -

Sugar Cookies (cut into shapes and decorated)
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 cup margarine or butter, softened
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar

Mix powdered sugar, margarine, egg, vanilla, and almond extract. Mix in flour, baking soda, and cream of tartar. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours. Heat oven to 375 degrees. Divide dough into halves. Roll each half 1/4" thick on lightly floured cloth-covered board. Cut into shapes with holiday cookie cutters or 2" round cutter. Place shapes on lightly greased sheet keeping shape. Bake until edges are light brown, 6-8 minutes depending on your oven. Cool on racks or newspapers, then decorate with colored frosting, colored icing, colored sugars, sprinkles, dried fruit bits....whatever strikes your fancy. Makes about 3 dozen holiday shapes or 5 dozen 2" cookies.

QUOTE]

Saw on HGTV this morning that you can take a very small tip paint brush and use food coloring to PAINT your cookies~something different for those "artsy" types!

[lilgoose]

What a wonderful idea, InLimbo! My sisters and I do a cookie/candy exchange every year together on a Saturday before Christmas. It's so much fun!

Here's one of my favorite cookie recipes that my family asks for every year -

Sugar Cookies (cut into shapes and decorated)
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 cup margarine or butter, softened
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar

Mix powdered sugar, margarine, egg, vanilla, and almond extract. Mix in flour, baking soda, and cream of tartar. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours. Heat oven to 375 degrees. Divide dough into halves. Roll each half 1/4" thick on lightly floured cloth-covered board. Cut into shapes with holiday cookie cutters or 2" round cutter. Place shapes on lightly greased sheet keeping shape. Bake until edges are light brown, 6-8 minutes depending on your oven. Cool on racks or newspapers, then decorate with colored frosting, colored icing, colored sugars, sprinkles, dried fruit bits....whatever strikes your fancy. Makes about 3 dozen holiday shapes or 5 dozen 2" cookies.

These are an especially big hit with young ones in the house who love to decorate these with all kinds of frosting, icing, and sprinkles. Enjoy!

I just have to let you (and everyone else) know that these made the BEST sugar cookies. I think they were even better the next day. Will use the recipe for other holidays or any time the kids want to decorate!

Thanks and hope every one has had a really nice Christmas and looking forward to the new year!