Christmas Baking Attack Plan – Week #2 – the Goodie Swap
Posted by Hallee on Dec 8, 2009 in Gift Ideas, Hallee's Galley, Holiday fare, Life, menus & menu planning, Recipes |
You are currently browsing comments. If you would like to return to the full story, you can read the full entry here: “Christmas Baking Attack Plan – Week #2 – the Goodie Swap”.
12 Comments
Leave a Reply
-
The Boston 3-Day
I will be walking the Boston 3-Day the last weekend in July in honor of Gregg's mom, Ryta Gail, who died from breast cancer when he was a little boy.
Find me on Facebook
Safe Site
We are committed to keeping the content on this site
family friendly and child safe.
-
Gregg & Hallee
Find Me on My Author Blog
* 
Here’s one of my favorite recipes. It’s new to me – I only got it from a friend a year ago – but it adds such nice variety to my cookie trays. It’s very, very orange-flavored, without being fake-orange at all. Very refreshing and yummy, not overly sweet like many treats this time of year, and it really balances out all the other things I put on my trays, lol!
One recipe yields about 3 – 3 1/2 dozen small cookies. They are prettier if you keep them on the small side. I put 2 dozen of these on each large tray I made last year (for teacher’s break rooms) and about 6-8 cookies on each small tray I made (for small offices and/or families)
Orange Drop Cookies with Orange Butter Icing
2/3 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup freshly squeezed orange juice
finely grated zest from 2 medium oranges
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
Heat Oven to 400 degrees. Mix shortening, sugar, and egg thoroughly. Stir in orange juice and zest. Stir dry ingredients together and blend in. Drop rounded teaspoonfuls of dough about 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 8 to 10 minutes (6 minutes in convection oven) or until delicately browned on the edges. Makes 3-4 dozen. Frost with orange butter icing.
Orange Butter Icing
5 Tbsp soft butter
3 cups confectioners sugar
3 Tbsp freshly squeezed orange juice
zest from 1 orange
Blend butter and sugar together. Stir in orange juice and rind until smooth.
You gave me this recipe before! I have it in my list of cookies to make. It sounds so yummy!
I made these today – YUM! Nice orange taste. I halved the frosting recipe and that just frosted all the cookies (I might have eaten one or two without the frosting! haha) Thanks for sharing the recipe!
These were a huge hit last year and if you like spice cookies, I think you’ll like these.
Ginger Almond Refrigerator Cookies (from the Betty Crocker Cooky Book)
1.5 c. shortening (I use unsalted butter)
1.5 c. sugar
3/4 c. molasses
4 c. flour
1.5 tsp. soda
1.5 tsp. salt
1 T. plus 1 tsp. ginger
1 T. cinnamon
1 T. cloves
1.5 cups sliced almonds, finely chopped
Cream shortening, sugar & molasses until fluffy. Mix together dry ingredients and add slowly into creamed mixture. Add almonds. Shape into 2 thick rolls about 2″ in diameter. Wrap in wax paper and chill for at least 3-4 hours.
Once dough is thoroughly chilled, preheat oven to 350. Cut logs into 1/4″ slices and bake on a lightly greased baking sheet 12-15 minutes.
Yield – approx. 7.5 dozen cookies
Those sound like perfect Christmasy cookies.
I made Double Chocolate Espresso Shortbread Cookies from myrecipes.com : http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=1672947
I made some Apple Pie shots (my recipe made 12 pint jars, plus an additional 1/2 gallon)
1 gallon apple cider
1/2 gallon apple juice
12 cinnamon sticks
1 cup sugar
Heat all of the above until sugar is dissolved and cinnamon flavoring is good. Cool completely, and add 1 quart of Everclear liquor. Chill well to serve!
I will be making one more cookie, but I’m having a hard time deciding which one! I’d love to make biscotti, otherwise some Peppermint Meltaway Cookies that were in my Taste of Home holiday cookbook. Here’s the link for those: http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/Peppermint-Meltaways
I LOVE baking, so I may end up making it all!
Apple Pie Shots – even the name sounds good!
Joanne – those dark chocolate espresso shortbread cookies are SO rich & flavorful. Thanks for sharing the recipe. I can’t wait to share them with my friends!
I am on the hunt for a new Gingerbread cookie receipe. The receipe I used last year made them too chrispy. I want them to be soft and moist. Any ideas?
Here’s Gregg’s recipe. It’s SO GOOD. And by so good, I mean, we ate ginger bread until I gained 30 pounds, then we made some more. :)
http://www.halleethehomemaker.com/2009/09/gingerbread-cookie-dough/
Soaking whole wheat flour is better nutritionally, but we didn’t have great success soaking it for cookies. They were good, but it was problematic to add the other ingredients later. So, I would disregard that part of the instructions if you want.
Awesome, thanks Hallee!!! I am so excited to try it this weekend.
Thanks for sharing all of those great recipes!
Hope you’ll join in tomorrow, I’m hosting Christmas Traditions and Memories for the Holly Bloggy Christmas Bash!!
~TidyMom