The holiday season is an especially busy time for us Quarter-Life Cooks. Among our twenty-something friends, our expertise is in high demand for planning, prepping, and decorating all sorts of festive gatherings. But one particular grown-up event we always look forward to attending is Kate's holiday party. Two years ago, we were rather delinquent helpers -- Cara had just flown back from Spain and could barely keep her eyes open, and I was busy all afternoon running around the city in a Santa suit. But last year, we were honored to be brought on board early in the process to decide what dishes would make it to the large banquet table for 100 of their closest friends.
As can be imagined, a meal for so many people is quite an impressive undertaking, especially with the high expectation for quality that Kate's mother, Barb, has upheld for the gathering year after year. Over Indian food sometime in November, Cara and I talked about the menu with Barb and Kate. There was a universal consensus that the famed corn pudding, scalloped potatoes, and spiked cider were must-have staples. Some newer additions: Beef Bourguignon for the main course, and lemon bars for the dessert spread. And as always, there were to be dozens of decorated Christmas cookies, the centerpiece of the table.
The Friday evening before the party, Cara and I showed up at the Kate's to offer our helpful hands. We thought, perhaps, the tasks ahead of us might involve browning 30 pounds of beef, peeling a large bag full of potatoes, or juicing lemon upon lemon for the squares, and we came prepared for blisters and exhaustion. Unsurprisingly though, given her all-powerful planning genius, complete with shopping lists from the last ten years, Barb had done almost all the work before we got there. The stew was simmering in the oven, the lemon bars were sitting on a beautiful glass platter, and all that was left for us to do was decorate the Christmas cookies.
Cara was elated by this news, but I, on the other hand, was a little worried. As my baking days have slipped away from me, I've become a little rusty when it comes to multiple icing shades, colored sugar, and snowflake shaped sprinkles. Summoning my artistry from 15 years ago, I got to work sprinkling green sugar on my Christmas trees, and haphazardly pasting candy cane morsels on the green shading. Cara looked over at my work, and looked at me with slight disappointment in her eyes. "Maybe try to make them a little fancier?" she said. Horrified by my apparent failure, I ate two cookies and started over.
Little did Cara know: she created a monster. For three hours, I obsessed over my cookies, picking out all the red colored balls to line stripes on my stockings, stringing ornaments in perfect bowing lines on my trees, and striping my candy canes in perfectly measured patches of color. The result was more beautiful than my seven-year-old memories, if involving way more patience and attention than should ever be imparted on a single cookie. Kate, holiday cheer master, was more than pleased with the results, as were we, until she plucked up one of my stockings and took a bite, and I suddenly felt like I had lost my best friend.
--Phoebe Lapine of Big Girls, Small Kitchen
Martha's Icing
Ices about 2 dozen of your favorite sugar cookies
Ingredients
1 egg white
2 cups powdered sugar
a few drops of lemon juice
food coloring
lots of sprinkles
Whisk ingredients together. Separate into bowls and add food coloring to create your desired scheme. Use knifes or offset spatulas for decorating. If you're ambitious, use icing bags with tips.
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10 to 12 different kinds.
She enjoyed every second of her HUGE holiday baking schedule.
I bake but when it comes to cookies, she was the BEST.
Sweet memories!
I set my holiday baking bar so high that some years I just can't clear it! Eight of Mum's old-world recipes plus biscotti and breads makes baking enough for gifting friends and co-workers an enormous chore. Sugar, butter, danish spice, almond cookies, pecan-topped shortbread, pignolli, ischelertortelletes, spritz, ginger-almond biscotti, chocolate-hazelnut biscotti, stollen and gingerbread are planned this year (2 down, 1 do-over and 9 to go!)
http://www.dessarts.com/2010/11/rangoli-cookies-for-a-happy-diwali.html
roll out some white, red, and green fondant (check your local hobby stores) - cut out the fondant with your cookie cutters, and place them on your cooled cookies instead of spending hours icing them all :D
RECIPE FOR SMALL BATCH:
Marshmallow fondant
1 cup mini marshmallows
1 tbsp water
1 1/2- 1 3/4 cup powdered sugar
Place marshmallows in a standard 1 cup measuring cup and push down and pack them in. Place in a microwave safe bowl and add the water. Put in the microwave for about 20 seconds. Just long enough for them to soften and puff up. Take out and stir with a spoon until it is combined well. At this point it looks kind of soupy. Then add the sugar and mix and fold until all is incorporated and it is no longer sticky. I take it out of the bowl when it gets to the point where most of the sugar is incorporated and I knead it in my hands. This takes roughly about 5-7 minutes. Take a fondant roller or a regular rolling pin and roll out just as you would Wilton's fondant. You can get this fondant almost paper thin and it also repairs well. It's cheap, easy to work with, and tastes great too. ***Microwaves times vary so please adjust to your own microwave.
- a friend on another site turned me on to homemade fondant - pretty easy and tastes so much better - bakers can even google it - there are a few really detailed youtubes so one can go step by step
note to anyone trying it - have lots more powdered sugar on hand than any of the recipes suggest
so glad the obsessive, Martha's tyranny years are behind me
...at least until the grandkids are born :D
http://www.wilton.com/recipe/Royal-Icing
I'm not a wilton fan, but it's hard to get away from using their products. It's wilton or adeco pretty much. They keep their prices high especially wilton. Duff has products on the market, but they're the same price
My sib and I were just b!tching about our crazy mom. Need to step back and be thankful that she's still around to b!tch about the crazy. We really do love her.
I'm lucky to live in the heart of Mennonite country and there's no way I could ever do better on my own than I do when I grab a dozen dozen cookies from Gracies which is an institution here. They do all the baking and I take the credit *lol*
For anyone in Southern Ontario.. it's worth the drive to St. Jacob's or one of the other pick-up points
www.gracieschristmascookies.com and they taste even better than they look