Christmas Cakes 2024

Candy Cane Christmas Cake from Curly Girl Kitchen

Gold and Green Christmas Tree Cake from Curly Girl Kitchen

Sugared Cranberry Orange Rosemary Cake from Must Love Herbs

Orange Pistachio Cookies

My husband is quite a good baker. I am hoping these cookies might be in my future...ahem...

Orange Pistachio Cookies

PREP TIME
15 minutes
SERVINGS
27 cookies

Ingredients
For the Cookies:
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons orange zest
1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For the Orange Glaze:
1 cup powdered sugar
3 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice
1 teaspoon orange zest
1 cup chopped pistachios

Instructions
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.Line two baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. Set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
3. In a small bowl, add granulated sugar and orange zest. Rub the sugar and orange zest together with your fingers, until fragrant.
4. In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat butter and sugar mixture together until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Beat
in egg and vanilla extract. Mix until smooth.
5. Slowly beat in flour mixture on low speed until blended. Drop dough by tablespoon onto prepared baking sheets, spacing 2 inches apart. Gently flatten dough with the palm of your hand. Bake for 12-14 minutes or until cookies are just set and slightly golden brown. Cool cookies on baking sheet for 2 minutes and transfer to cooking
racks. Cool completely.
6. While the cookies are cooling, make the orange glaze. In a medium bowl, whisk together powdered sugar, orange juice, and zest. Dip each cookie top into the orange glaze. Sprinkle
pistachios on top of each cookie. Let cookies sit until glaze has set.
Note-cookies will keep in an airtight container on the counter for up to 3 days.

Recipe from Two Peas & Their Pod
https://www.twopeasandtheirpod.com/orange-pistachio-cookies/

Brush Stroke Cakes by Kalabasa

Moscow-based bakery Kalabasa decorates cakes and cupcakes with hardened brush strokes of colorful ganache, rendering cakes works of art fit for Jackson Pollock!

https://kalabasa.ru/

Seen On Maui: Komoda Bakery

I'm currently on Maui in the Hawaiian Islands and I just had to make a pilgrimage to the world famous Komoda Bakery for cream puffs and donuts on a stick. Located in the sleepy little Upcountry village of Makawao, Komoda Bakery was opened in 1916 by Takezo Komoda and his wife Shigeri as a restaurant and sandwich shop. It wasn't until 1947 when Takezo's brother Ikuo returned to Makawao with pastry recipes from a stint at a cooking school in Minneapolis that Komoda's found its footing as a bakery. Soon their cream puffs became famous and the long glazed donuts were placed on wooden skewers--a unique touch to be sure. Popular with locals and tourists (haoles) alike, Komoda's celebrates 100 years in business this November 2016. If you find yourself on Maui, drop by for cream puffs and a donut on a stick--but get there early, the line starts forming outside before they open at 7AM!

Embroidered Cookies by Judit Czinkné Poór of Mézesmanna

Hungarian chef Judit Czinkné Poór has a background in porcelain painting which explains how she is so facile with a bag of royal icing when making her incredible gingerbread cookies. They look like traditional Eastern European embroidery and lace.

https://www.facebook.com/Mezesmanna
https://www.instagram.com/mezesmanna/

Holiday Cookies 2015

My first clear memory of winter is connected to our house on West Main Street, in a picturesque village on the Oatka Creek in upstate New York. My mother hung wreaths of red, crinkled cellophane with a single tiny red bulb in the front windows. We had a fireplace and my mother and father helped me make a long chain of loops cut from colored construction paper to hang from the mantel. Mom made her Christmas butter cookies and I associate their warm, safe smell and luscious, enveloping taste exclusively with Christmas. We mixed white frosting with food coloring to get red and green and I got to frost a few cookies, and then sprinkle on the multi-colored decorations. I ate several before bed each night with a glass of milk and it was heaven. And of course, Santa had to have some on Christmas Eve so my mom and I would leave a little plate for him--and a carrot for the reindeer.

Regular readers know I lost my mom several years ago and I try to keep the holiday cookie tradition alive...I have her recipe box and this is from her recipe card, in her own handwriting:

Mom’s Christmas Butter Cookies
Sift together three cups of flour, one teaspoon of baking powder and half of a teaspoon of salt. Then cream together one cup of butter and three quarters of a cup of sugar; stir in one unbeaten egg, two tablespoons of milk and two tablespoons of fine vanilla extract and mix well. Add the dry ingredients a third at a time. Chill the dough for one hour. Roll the dough onto a floured surface with a floured rolling pin. Roll to one-eighth of an inch thickness. Use cookie cutters and place them on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake them five to eight minutes at 350*, watching carefully. Frost and decorate. Enjoy.

Gingerbread Houses 2015

BEAUTY: Painting--Joël Penkman

Oh, how I love donuts. Joël Penkman's Cakes & Biscuits series portrays in a romanticized realist style, delicious cakes, donuts, sweets, and cookies.

Top to bottom: Biscuits In A Line; Dougnut Dozen; Fondant Fancy; Jam Tarts; Krispy Kreme Dozen; Pair of Wafers; Party Ring

http://joelpenkman.com