Holiday Baking...

I'm not known for my cooking, but  I do like to bake this time of year.  This year my sister-in-law and I decided to do our baking together.  It was so much more fun to do this with someone than to do it all on our own.  We watch Christmas with the Kranks, listened to some Christmas music, and had a lot of good conversation.  It was snowy and cold outside, and the kitchen was warm.  Here are some of the yummies I made.  

I tried a new recipe this year that was basically shortbread with maraschino cherries in it.  They are so yummy!  The recipe calls for white chocolate, but I am not a huge white chocolate fan and I omitted it.  You can find the recipe here.  My final cookies turned out beautifully.  Better yet, they even tasted as good as they looked.

Next up, it was time for my No-Fail Fudge.  It lives up to its name, and in several years of making it, it's never come out wrong.  I made chocolate pecan, and in some of it I added a bit of almond extract for a little extra flavoring. 

 

Next up it was time to make some sugar cookies.  I bake the cookies ahead of time, and then later in the week my best friend and her lovely four year old will come over and we will decorate them, go look at Christmas lights, and this year exchange our gifts early because her family is going away for a couple weeks.  We might even order pizza.  Here they are plain.  I'll post photos later in the week after decorations occur.

Last, but certainly not least, it was time to make cream cheese mints.  Heaven!  Thanks to advice from my cousin Lisa, (thanks Lisa!!), I was able to mold them quite easily by refrigerating dough first and rolling in lots of sugar.  I made green and red roses. 

I still can't believe nothing burned, nothing went wrong, and everything came out looking the way I had hoped.  Add in the zucchini bread my sis-in-law made, I'd estimate I consumed somewhere around two kabillion calories yesterday, but then I went and did a teensy bit of Christmas shopping, so I like to think I worked all those calories off.  

I will have one more baking day before Christmas, but not sure what recipes I will try then.  Let me know what your favorite holiday treats are!