My Gift Tags for 2010

OK well for my final posting before Christmas I am going to give some freebies. Several years ago when I had only one child and more time on my hands I would hand make Christmas tags. I cut out layers of paper and put them together to form a design. While I was wrapping presents with my husband last night I remembered where I had stashed a few extras. I only had two of the three or four designs I know I did. But I took the two I had and copied them out for you to print and use if you so wish. Here is the first one I did:

Document 1

You should be able to click the "print" button on the image and print it. This is my first time doing this so fingers are crossed.
The second one I had made was of a dove. This is what it looks like:

Doc 2

I suggest using a thick card stock for these. I hope you enjoy them. Please have a safe and wonderful time with whatever holiday you happen to celebrate. Merry Christmas.

Now That's Using Your Noggin'! Store bought vs. Homemade

What I really want for Christmas this year is a lobotomy, but I'll settle for a good glass of eggnog. I am a big fan of eggnog. It's creamy and smooth and it makes you feel all warm inside. It's the perfect holiday drink.

The problem I have though, is that even though I've had homemade eggnog I've never preferred it to the store bought stuff. Why is that a problem??? Well, I am a firm believer that 9.99999 times out of 10 you can do a better job making it at home. So this year I put myself to a challenge, to come up with an eggnog recipe better than the stores.
I started by scouring the Internet for eggnog recipes. After I had looked at exactly umpteen different recipes I found something, no one has ever really played with eggnog before. Why not? Every single recipe was basically the same; egg yolks, milk, cream, and nutmeg.

The good thing about cooking is you learn to put flavors together. Sometimes on purpose and sometimes by accident. I thought about the flavor and texture of eggnog and what else might be good with it. I thought caramel, but that was a little too sweet. Then I adjusted my thought of caramel to dulce de leche, and my eggnog recipe started to come together. For anyone who has never had dulce de leche, the best way I can describe it is like a really good homemade Sugar Daddy but in a thick liquid form. It's awesome on ice cream (or as an ice cream flavor), on yogurt, drizzled on waffles, pound cake, you get the idea. It is time consuming, but it's worth it to make your own. They sell it at store but you pay an arm and a leg for what costs pennies and takes a little time. So I leave it up to you as to how you would acquire it, but here is my recipe:

Dulce de Leche Eggnog

(Inspired by Alton Brown's Eggnog recipe)

For the dulce de Leche:

• 1 quart whole milk
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped out
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 tablespoons water

For the Eggnog:

• 4 eggs separated
• 1/2 cup dulce de leche
• 1 pint whole milk
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg, freshly grated is always best

Directions for the Dulce de Leche:

1. In a LARGE ( like larger then you could possibly think) heavy saucepan, combine the milk, sugar, vanilla bean, and scraped seeds. Bring the mixture to a simmer over medium heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. When the milk starts to get foamy, stir to incorporate the foam.
2. In a small bowl combine the baking soda and water Add the mixture to the milk. When you do this you will see why you used such a large pot. It will foam up like a science experiment gone wrong. It will subside but the initial reaction is big and you need to contain it or you will have a milky mess to contend with. No one likes a milky mess.
3. Reduce heat to low and cook at barely a simmer for one hour, stirring occasionally without working the foam into the milk. After the one hour remove the vanilla bean.
4. Continue cooking, skimming the surface occasionally, until it is dark brown, very thick, and reduced to about one cup. This will take anywhere from 1 1/2 - 3 hours depending on your stove. Strain it into a clean container to get out any chunks. You'll need a spatula to help it through since it will be thick like caramel. Cover and refrigerate until you are ready to use it, it will keep for up to two weeks in your refrigerator.

This is what it looks like when it is just getting started in the pot.

And THIS is what it looks like when it is done. You know it's done when it has reduced the proper amount. That's the best way to tell. So just stir it every now and then and skim the top like you would any jam.

Directions for the Eggnog:

1. With a mixer beat the egg yolks until they turn a light yellow. Then add a 1/2 cup of the prepared dulce de leche, beat until well combined.
2. In a medium saucepan, over high heat, combine the milk, heavy cream and the nutmeg , and heat it until it just starts to boil, stirring it occasionally. Remove from the heat and gradually temper the egg yolks with the milk mixture until combined. Then return it to the pot and heat it again until the temperature is 160 degrees. Remove it from the heat, pour into a container, and set it in your refrigerator until it is chilled.
3. Once the eggnog has cooled beat the egg whites in a medium mixing bowl until stiff peaks form. Whisk the egg whites into the eggnog.
4. At this point you can add the liquor of your choosing and enjoy. It will serve as many as you choose.

Note: In case you didn't notice, while the recipe does have you cook the egg yolks, the egg whites are raw. If you are not cool with the risks that involves (Salmonella) you can omit the egg whites all together. They do however make the eggnog frothy and light which, as I am about to go into, is a large part of why I like it so much.

So what I did next was go to the store and buy some Turkey Hill eggnog, which is my husband's favorite. I poured my eggnog and the Turkey Hill into their own tasting glasses and we sat down to see who's was better...homemade? Or...Store bought.

Mine is the frothy one in the back row.

Personally, I love my recipe. I always found the store bought to be too sweet and have too strong of an aftertaste. Mine is light and silky, it hits you with the nutmeg and leaves you with an aftertaste of milky caramel. I thought it had just the right amount of sweetness. It is still definitely eggnog, but it has that bit of difference that sets it apart from the pack and makes it special ( Not unlike yours truly). My husband still loves his Turkey Hill but he is a huge fan of this recipe as well. Plus...if you make enough you have also made a great ice cream base that can be thrown into your ice cream maker (Just don't add in the booze or it will never freeze). So enjoy! I hope you make it and love it as much as I do!

The way the cookie crumbles

Well my oven is repaired so it's crunch time for Christmas. I figured I'd share my all time favorite gingerbread cookie recipe. It's so friggin' good that if you even remotely enjoy the taste of gingerbread you have to make a batch of these. They are a crunchy melt in your mouth Christmas delight. They are the gingerbread that I grew up with, straight out of the green binder that holds all of my family recipes. I got the green binder from my mom when I got married. My mom got the recipe from her friend Marcia. Marcia got it from a Moravian cookbook. And now I will give it to you.

Moravian Cookies

Ingredients:

• 4 1/2 cups all purpose flour, sifted
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 cup light brown sugar, firmly packed
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
• 1 1/2 cups dark molasses (or one 12oz. jar)
• 1/2 teaspoon cider vinegar

Directions:

1. Sift together in a bowl the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cloves, and ginger. Set aside.
2. In the bowl of an electric stand mixer combine the light brown sugar, butter, and shortening. Mix until fluffy.
3. Gradually add the molasses and vinegar into the stand mixer. Mix thoroughly.
4. With the setting on low slowly add in the reserved flour mixture. Mix until all the flour mixture is well combined.
5. Chill dough until firm. At least 4 hours. Better if overnight. Or you can make it a couple of weeks in advance and freeze it until you are ready to use it. Just pull it from the freezer and let it sit in your refrigerator overnight.
6. When ready to bake preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Roll out the dough on a floured surface to 1/8 of an inch thick. Not more then 1/4 of an inch. Cut out your shapes making sure they are of somewhat similar size.
7. Bake on a silpat lined cookie sheet for 10-13 minutes depending on how thick they were.

Note: This dough is very sticky. You need to refrigerate any dough you are not currently working with. Any leftover dough can be combined, stuck in the freezer for 15-20 minutes and re-rolled.

I love these cookies because they are crisp and melt in your mouth. When I am thinking gingerbread cookies, these are the cookies I'm thinking of.They have a strong gingerbread flavor. Plus I can make the dough whenever I have time and then just wrap it and stick it in the freezer until I'm ready to deal with it. Last year I forgot about some dough and found it mid summer. So we had gingerbread cookies in July. Hey, why not? The recipe will make about 72 cookies depending on the size of the cookie cutter you use. I already made 63 so far this year and I've only used 3/4 of the dough.

So what do you do with all these cookies??? Well why not let your kids go to town decorating them for their teachers :)

Lily put boobs on this one. But look...she also gave it eyes! I was really impressed.

Lily's cookies

Naiya's cookies were a bit more refined.

So go ahead and try a batch. If you like gingerbread you will like these. And if you don't you can send them my way, I won't mind a bit.

A little Christmas cheer

A lot of people get stressed out this time of year. There's a lot to juggle and sometimes the reason we do it gets lost in the doing of it. I try really hard to go out of my way to be kind to people around Christmas. Even if it's just holding the door for someone or letting them take that left turn at the traffic light, if you can bring a smile to someones face and ease the Holiday hustle and bustle for a moment I think it's worth it. So here are some cartoons I found that I hope make you chuckle a little.

We're not frying anything ever again

Today was an eventful and sad day. Today I lost a dear friend in my kitchen...our gas stove.
Really I blame the McRib for this. If it wasn't for the McRib this probably never would have happened. I shake my fist at you McDonald's with all of your ridiculously brilliant advertising!!!! That was what we were supposed to have for dinner tonight. Then my husband (who I am not angry with for this) decided that he wanted to try a knock off recipe of McDonald's french fries to go with the homemade McRibs.
I am not a fan of frying. All that grease disagrees strongly with my digestive track, it makes the house smell gross, and it's scary the way the oil bubbles up so fast. I have fried a few things out of my love for my husband in the past five years, but I always proceed with the utmost caution. But fries my husband wanted so fries he decided to make.
I was sitting at the kitchen table when he started. I guess the oil had been too hot so prior to dropping in the first batch of fries he had turned the burner off and let the oil come back down to temperature. Thankfully, or else when he dropped those potatoes in and the oil boiled over they would have been met by an open flame. That would have been disastrous. As it was,  the oil bubbled over...about half of the oil he had put in the pot. It filled the burner area with about a 1/4 inch of oil, soaked the elements, and unknown by us went down under the elements and soaked into the insulation that surrounded the oven to keep the heat in.
We must have spent the better part of a 1/2 hour cleaning up the oil with paper towels, and then with soap and water. Then my husband decided to turn on the burners to make sure they were working. They lit, but when he turned them off smoke started coming out from under the cook surface, where we couldn't see what was going on.  Where there is smoke there is fire right???
So I did what everyone never wants to do, I called 911. After explaining to the operator what was going on I was informed that the fire department would be dispatched to my house. Now you need to understand that we live in a smallish town. We are located less then a mile from the fire department, the volunteer fire department, the EMS, and the police. Upon hanging up the phone I could here the siren at the fire department going off. I hung my head in shame.  Less then two minutes later we had all types of emergency vehicles filling up our tiny street. My daughter counted four fire trucks but apparently there had been more at first.
The firemen decided that they were going to have to remove the top of my stove. I felt sick to my stomach. I literally walked out of the room...I couldn't watch. I had to fight with hhgregg for almost 3 months to get that oven to begin with. At least then I had the oven that came with the house to tide me over until the new one arrived. I haven't even had it for 6 months yet. We were just getting to know each other! Plus, I am cooking 80% of our holiday gifts this year which I was going to start knocking out this week. So much for all my upcoming blogs.

I understand though, they had to make sure it was safe. Which it wasn't. The oil had gone under the element and had soaked into the insulation. It was 500 degrees when they scanned it with this infrared thing and we hadn't had the burner on in more then 1/2 and hour. It would have been way worse if it had caught fire later on when we weren't watching and burnt my kitchen up. I know all of this and I am thankful that I had them there to make it safe again.
So now, I have a new hobby for the next week or two. I get to see if by some miracle we can get our oven repaired or replaced for free. If not I'll have some last minute Christmas shopping to do. But there will be no more stove top frying in this house ever again. That much I can promise you.

To Do's

I was never a list girl. Perhaps I never had enough to do that required a list to be formally written up. Perhaps I was young enough and getting enough sleep so that I was able to remember everything. Then I had kids. All of a sudden there are a million things to do in a day and I can't remember any of them. I move about like a sleep deprived zombie attempting to function as a responsible adult. Just ask my best friend coffee or my other good friend tea. I have found myself turning to pads of paper and chewed on pens for a support group. "Hi, my name is Amanda and I can't remember what I have to do today." So now...I am a list girl.
My lists are usually about a page long. I get very sad when they stretch beyond that. I can normally accomplish about 3/4 of what is on my list and the rest I move onto the next days list.  Now you need to understand that if something makes it on the list that doesn't mean it WILL get done, it just means that I have acknowledged the fact that it SHOULD get done. If it's not on the list it doesn't have a chance. Like the laundry or the dishes my lists never end.
I know I am not the only list maker. There are many of us privately writing out a long depressing lists of shame. My husband and my mother are two others I know that do this. Everyone seems to have their own technique. My husband for example will not include on his list anything that he would normally do in a day. I find this to be a fatal mistake in the art of list making. My lists will include everything that I normally do in a day (laundry, dishes, etc.) and sometimes...things I have already done...*GASP*...and I don't care how pathetic that may sound. I remember when my children were newborns...my lists would read something like:

1. Get out of bed
2. Make bed
3. Get dressed
4. Take shower??
5. Make list

You see the beauty in that is by the time I was done writing my list I had already finished one of the things on it! I had already accomplished something for the day (pats myself on the back here).
I am slightly less sleep deprived now-a-days. So my lists are longer and they include more than what I would normally do in a day...most of the time...sometimes. But I did find myself the other week feeling overwhelmed. I had already taken out the trash by the time I had sat down to write my list for the day. However I didn't hesitate to write down "Take out trash" and then immediately cross it out with a satisfactory sweep of my chewed up pen from the scrap of paper that my two year old had gotten to and colored on.
So you see world, I am a woman that gets stuff done!

Fruitcake: The Main Event

Well it's been two weeks and I've been faithfully spritzing and basting my fruitcakes, now the time has come. Who will win the title for battle of the fruitcakes 2010? Will the champion be Grandma, or Alton Brown?

On the left we have my Grandmother's fruitcake and on the right is Alton Brown's...as if you couldn't tell be the differences in the fruits.

Before we get to the results I must inform you that the fruitcake I made in hope's that is was my Grandmother's (of which I have very fond memories) was not. It is a family recipe, specifically that of my Great Grandmother Mary Hope Copeland but it is not the fruitcake of my memory. To further my sadness I received the Gifts From Your Kitchen cookbook, referenced in a sticky note on the recipe I used, that my loving Husband found online only to discover that it wasn't the right one and there aren't even any fruitcake recipes in it *sob*. So it seems that the fruitcake recipe that I look back on so fondly is gone to the ages. So I will be reviewing my Great Grandmother's recipe today in it's stead.

Great Grandma's fruitcake

Both my Husband and my Daughter Naiya prefered this fruitcake. For my husband it was due to the fact that Alton Brown's fruitcake calls for minced orange and lemon rind, neither one of which he likes. He said that if you removed those from Alton's recipe that he would probably prefer that one. Although he questions the integrity of any recipe that calls for green cherries. Naiya prefered my Grandmother's because it wasn't so laden with alcohol like Alton's was. I did not baste this one as frequently as I did Alton's, and I was using Sherry for hers while for Alton's I was using Brandy. I personally thought the spice flavor was too strong in My Great Grandmother's and I didn't think that the flavor of the spices meshed very well with the flavor of the fruits. The only thing I thought it had over Alton's was an impressive stained glass effect when held up to the light. Jude liked either fruitcake and was very sad when the tasting was over. Lily didn't like either of the fruitcakes and asked for ice cream instead.

Like an artificially colored stained glass window.

Alton Brown's fruitcake

And now for a closer look at Alton Brown's fruitcake. In my humble opinion, as well as my Mom's... (and really since it's my blog, mine's the only opinion that matters ;P ) Alton Brown is the winner in this fight and gets the title of best fruitcake 2010. I feel better about saying this since it wasn't my Grandmother's recipe. I found the flavor to be richer and better balanced. It was moister, which I'm sure had a lot to do with all the alcohol it consumed over the two week period it sat in my refrigerator. I also like a lot of fruit in my fruitcake and Alton's had more then my Great Grandmother's recipe. I might have added in some more nuts for a bigger texture difference but there isn't anything I can really think of to improve it. It is lacking in the wide variety of color that the other recipe had but it was still pretty to look at.

So my conclusion in this showdown is that both recipes are good and certainly not door stopper material. I'm happy that my two biggest mousers prefer my Great Grandmother's recipe so that I can take my time and enjoy Alton's all to myself. I think I will pin Alton's recipe against another recipe next year to see if it can hold it's own against a recipe of my choosing. And I will save my Great Grandmother's recipe for a cookbook to hand down to my Children. This was a fun food experiment for me and my family. I hope you enjoyed it too.

A Few Christmas Favorites

I love Christmas. It's a time to remember, a time to share, a time to give, a time to love, a time for thanks. But my absolute favorite thing to do during the Christmas season is to decorate the tree. Growing up my favorite gift every year was from Granny (My Great Grandmother). She spent all year making a shoe box full of ornaments for her Great Grandchildren. Lucky me that I was one of them. My parents would make me open that gift last because I would take forever examining each one. Granny has been gone for 15-16 years now but every year she is here at Christmas. I can decorate a 7 foot tree with just her ornaments.




Here I am at two years old looking at one of Granny's ornaments.

Making ornaments was sort of a family thing though because both of my Grandmothers made some ornaments (Although not nearly as many as Granny), my Mom has also made ornaments and now my children and I do too. I thought I would share a couple of the ideas for ornaments I have done with my kids. Besides being able to do something with your little ones these ornaments can also be given as gifts to Grandparents or Aunts and Uncles.
The first one is actually one I adapted. It uses up old Christmas cards which is a great idea by itself, but I used some of my kids art in them and got a great result.

Here are the directions from Scoutie girl http://www.scoutiegirl.com/2009/12/tutorial-crafting-a-holiday-card-keepsake-ornament-by-nicole-of-lillyella.html What I did was have my kids paint on some card stock. I used this as my paper for the ornament. Then I made sure to write each kids name and the year it was made on one side of the ornament.

The next idea is really simple to do as well. All you need is some felt, some embroidery thread, a little ribbon, and your child's hand. This works best when you have a child that is 18 months or younger so that their hands are still super small. First you trace their hand on a piece of paper. Make sure that their fingers are together with their thumb separate like they are wearing a mitten.

This is how you want the hand to look on the paper.

Once the hand is traced on the paper you want to make it more of a "mitten" shape. When you are done it should look like this:

Then you simply cut out the shape, trace it twice for a front and a back onto whatever felt you chose and cut out the felt.

Once the felt is cut out you use the embroidery thread (I like to use a complimentary color for the thread) and stitch the front and the back together. After it is stitched together you can add embellishments if you want. On this one I used faux fur and then I had my daughter glue on buttons. After that you add a piece of the ribbon for a loop to hang it from the tree.

I like to attach the loop on the bottom of the mitten where I drew the red loop on. I like the way it looks when they hang, but you could put it wherever you like.

Those are my two top favorite ornaments to make with my little ones for our family. They are really quick and easy but they look like they took forever and everyone always loves them. Plus with the mitten one it reminds you of how small they used to be :)

Another one of my favorite gift ideas is to make a yearly calender using my children's art. We do this every year for our family. It's especially neat because it started out being just Naiya and this year Lily did some stuff for the calender too. I like to use vistaprint http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/welcomeback.aspx?xnav=welcome&GNF=1&rd=2
I find their program really easy to use. All I do is the design your own calender, which allows me to choose the template and then I add in the art I want. They make desk calenders or wall calenders so there are options, which is always a bonus. I just scan, or take pictures of the drawings or whatever it happens to be and then upload those images onto their site. I can put whichever image into whichever month, and add or remove Holidays (I always make sure to put in every body's birthdays and anniversaries). If you order them in mid-November the calenders are usually 50% off and then you can use their slow shipping to save more money because there's plenty of time for it to get to you. This is a gift that they can enjoy all year and it doesn't clutter up the house which I always appreciate :) Here's one of the paintings from Lily and one from Naiya  for a little sneak peek at our family calender this year.





Lily's marble painting.




A painting soon to be framed that Naiya did at the beginning of the summer.