Christmas Recipe Roundup

Welcome to this year's Christmas Recipe Roundup, and thank you to everyone who participated. I've divided the recipes into categories, starting (why not?) with dessert.


Desserts

Given Grace contributes a recipe for Aunt Anne's Tortoni, which is either a sweet salad or a dessert, and a family favourite.

I've posted a recipe for Cranberry Apple Pie--an easy way to give an apple pie a festive red colour for Christmas. And it tastes yummy, too.

Update: Sheena of The Preacher's Wife serves up a traditional British Christmas treat: Mince Pies.

Juanita of Jam and Books adds some Canadian flavour to the feast with a recipe for Butter Tarts.

I was shocked to learn a few years ago that my American friends didn't know what butter tarts were. I still don't really understand how someone could not have had butter tarts but thought I would try to rectify this by posting a recipe.

Another contribution from Jaunita--Dark Fruit Cake. She says,

I know - everyone loves to hate it. But you haven't tasted my mother's fruitcake! Mmm....

Yet More Updating: Sheena links to recipe for the best Christmas Pudding ever.

Cookies and Squares (or Bars)

Ian McKenzie has a food blog, Thought for Food, and he's posted a recipe for Sacher Torte Bites.

They are fairly simple to make, but seem to be an elegant addition to a cookie platter. I always trot out a batch of these at Christmas, for my office mates.

Kim of The Upward Call bakes up Butterhorns.

This is a fantastic, easy recipe, and it's one that my family loves. I have had many other people tell me they like it too.

Rosemary of Seasonings has a recipe for the best gingerbread cookies ever.

If you like a pungent, gingery cookie that is perfect for dunking into coffee or tea, this is it!

Kim of Hiraeth rolls out Chocolate Peppermint Pinwheel Cookies, which, she says,

are gorgeous, delicious cookies. Rolling them up into pinwheels is a bit tricky but if I can do it, you can too!

Island Sparrow makes Sugar Cookies from an old Purity Cookbook she inherited from her mother, so you might say these cookies, in addition to being scrumptious, have sentimental value.

These sugar cookies are one of our favourite Christmas recipes from this cookbook.I have tried a lot of sugar cookie recipes and I like this one the best.

I posted a recipe for Rosettes, a traditional Norwegian deep fat fried cookie.

Update: Juanita has a recipe for that famous Canadian treat, Nanaimo Bars, which are named for a city on Vancouver Island. I'm with Juanita, and I don't like them very much--they're too rich for my tastes--but many people really, really love them.

And from Juanita, too: Rocky Roads. She says her mother "used to hide them in the freezer. They taste awfully good frozen." I wonder how she knows that?

Annette adds two cookie recipes, one for jam-filled Foundation Cookies, and another for Pepper Nuts.

Candy

Carla of Reflections of the Times shares a recipe for Magic Disappearing Christmas Fudge. Not only is this fudge easy to make--ten minutes, she says--but it does a disappearing act, too.

Kim from Hiraeth discovered her Frango Fudge recipe "by happy chance." It's like Marshall Fields legendary Christmas candy, Frangos.

Snacks

Candyinsierras, who says that "[e]verybody has a standard snack or treat that they present for Christmas" gives us the recipe for one that she makes: Salsa Cheese Spread.

Update: Jane has added her recipe for Candied Dill Pickles in the comments to this post. The only complaint she has with these pickles is that her children "think all pickles should taste this good." Instead of throwing that yummy dill pickle juice away, though, why not hard boil some eggs. let them soak in the pickle juice for 3 days, and you'll have delicious pickled eggs to accompany your Candied Dill Pickles.


Main Dishes

Yet another update: Miss Mellifluous of Regaining Paradise shares her Christmas Lunch recipe, Pancetta and Basil Wrapped Chicken, which she serves "cold, cut into strips with various bean, watermelon, greek and potato salads." She lives in Australia, so a cold Christmas lunch makes perfect sense, but she says

as this dish is meant to be served hot wth a delicious creamy gravy, I thought I would share it with those of you in colder climates. However you choose to serve this dish you can be sure it will be well received because it is scrumdiddlyumptious and dead easy to cook!

Gifts

These are things that make good Christmas gifts, but of course, you can whip them up for yourself as well.

Violet of Promptings has a recipe for Poppycock, a delicious snack to give away.

Violet also makes a vegetarian antipasto, which she sometimes gives as a gift if it's well sealed. This recipe comes with her family's stamp of approval.

Rosemary of Seasoning has a recipe for Holiday Home Scent, which she promises

will fill your home with the spicy, citrusy scents of Christmas.

. . .This is also a wonderful, inexpensive hostess gift. . . .You may as well include the recipe too, because they'll want it!

So what are you waiting for? Time to head to the kitchen now!

The pictures accompanying this post are from Carl Larsson, a Swedish water colour painter famous for his paintings of home life at the turn of the 20th century. You can click on the pictures to see a larger view. Candyinsierras has posted some other painting by Carl Larsson at Shook Foil.