topic Re: Christmas cookie baking started today! in Kitchen

Christmas cookie baking started today!

Mominohio — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 18:01:24 GMT

I always bake most of my Christmas cookies before Thanksgiving, and freeze them for the season.

I started today, and am making better progress than I expected.

The handed down recipes we have used for generations freeze so well, some actually don't taste right if they haven't been frozen! I use the same vintage cookie tins that my great aunt and mom used to store them in the deep freeze.

I always like to have the baking done before I decorate, but often save the candy making for December.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

dex — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 19:24:38 GMT

Sounds wonderful and I bet your family looks forward to the tins finally coming out of the freezer.What types of cookies do you make that freeze so well

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

Mominohio — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 20:01:17 GMT

@dex

The small circle of family and friends that we share our cookies and candy with are always glad to see those tins come back out of the freezer!

Most of the cookies I make are recipes that go back to my grandmother or before. Time tested and never fail in the baking process and the freezing process.

Cacoons

Buterscotch Chews

Buttermilk sugar cookies

Peanut butter blossoms (I think that is the right name for them, the ones with the Hershey's kisses on top)

Date Pinwheels

and I can't think of the others right now.

and then a couple of things I found in recent years,

Shortbread Thumbprint cookies with jam filling

and a chocolate chip bar type cookie with a frosting.

Candies include fudge, buckeyes, Oreo bark, peanut clusters in white chocolate, and a mix of Cheerios, pretzels, nuts, and M&M's covered in white chocolate, mixed and dropped much like a no bake cookie, and molded white and milk chocolate in various holiday molds.

I really enjoy the process of making and giving these. I am cutting back some this year. Still doing all types, just less of each.

We seem to be eating less of this kind of thing, and giving less away as our circumstances change, with kid growing up, and not as involved with school and some other things we used to be part of.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

dex — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 20:36:47 GMT

Mominohio sure sounds like a grand assortment of decadence.I wish that I was your neighbor because I'd be by for tastings...I don't bake because some of family is watching weight and others sugars.The good old days when we could eat whatever and no Consecuenses.

You definitely have a lot of work ahead to get all those treats made and it is a good thing that you enjoy the process.I bet your cookie plate looks beautiful.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

terric — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 20:47:33 GMT

Hello mominohio!

I'm new to this forum, but I love baking and looked into your thread. You mention "tins" coming out of the freezer. Are you using actual cookie tins with the cookies already baked? I was planning to freeze cookie "dough" in plastic containers then worried that the dough might not hold until I'm actually ready to bake. Would you recommend that I just bake the cookies and freeze them? Thanks so much for the information!

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

beckyb1012 — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 21:03:01 GMT

This past week-end I baked my cookies and my chocolate peanut butter fudge. All ready and waiting in the freezer and now every night I just try not to hear it calling my name.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

Mominohio — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 22:44:42 GMT

@terric wrote:
Hello mominohio!
I'm new to this forum, but I love baking and looked into your thread. You mention "tins" coming out of the freezer. Are you using actual cookie tins with the cookies already baked? I was planning to freeze cookie "dough" in plastic containers then worried that the dough might not hold until I'm actually ready to bake. Would you recommend that I just bake the cookies and freeze them? Thanks so much for the information!

@terric

Welcome to the forum! Especially the kitchen and home forums are full of great people who love to share ideas and all things home.

I'm sure it will depend on exactly what you are baking, as some things freeze well, while others may not. I use time tested recipes that we have frozen for generations now.

And yes, the cookies are completely baked, iced or powdered or whatever they need, then frozen, layered with wax paper between the layers, in the big round cookie tins that you can find either at the craft stores or walmart. Some came with store bought cookies in them years ago. I know thrift stores usually have them by the tons this time of year for anywhere from a quarter to a dollar each.

This way I just have to take out the tins, and make up cookie plates, and move on with the holiday.

I've never frozen any kind of dough, but I know many people do with good results. If a recipe doesn't state that you can, you could start experimenting with it and test it out.

Someone here might know which types of dough will freeze well and which ones don't. You could start a thread asking just that question.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

Mominohio — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 22:46:23 GMT

@beckyb1012 wrote:
This past week-end I baked my cookies and my chocolate peanut butter fudge. All ready and waiting in the freezer and now every night I just try not to hear it calling my name.

@beckyb1012

If it would help you out, I'd be glad to store your goodies in my freezer until closer to the holiday.

Would you hold it against me if there might be less in the containers when they came out than when they went in?

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

jaxs mom — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 23:30:55 GMT

@terric wrote:
Hello mominohio!
I'm new to this forum, but I love baking and looked into your thread. You mention "tins" coming out of the freezer. Are you using actual cookie tins with the cookies already baked? I was planning to freeze cookie "dough" in plastic containers then worried that the dough might not hold until I'm actually ready to bake. Would you recommend that I just bake the cookies and freeze them? Thanks so much for the information!

I've frozen cookie dough before. I did a double batch of chocolate chip cookies and then portioned them with a scooper on lined sheet pans so each one was individually frozen. Once they were frozen I put them in ziplock bags and we backed a couple at a time when we wanted them. They actually bake better that way, right from frozen because they don't spread as much. I can't help with using the method for Christmas cookie recipes though.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

Susan in California — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 23:46:53 GMT

@Mominohio

Wow! i am impressed. I love your traditions. I wish more of us still

baked, especially the coveted recipes we share within families.

I also bake, and some of the outcomes are better than others.

I would give myself a B/B- most of the time. In most cases, anything

homemade tastes superior to commercially made.

Thanks for sharing your cookie baking plans; it was fun reading about

it.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

terric — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 09:17:14 GMT

Thank you so much, mominohio, for your helpful suggestions! Looking forward to getting started with the baking and to continuing discussions with the lovely people in this forum! Happy Holidays!

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

terric — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 09:37:16 GMT

Thanks so much, Jaxs Mom!

....

debic — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 12:12:20 GMT

I don't make my cookies until a week before Christmas. I grew up in ND and I make Scandanavian cookies from my childhood.

Rosettes

Krumkakke

Snowballs

Sanbakkel

Pepperkakker

Gingersnaps

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

beckyb1012 — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 14:52:09 GMT

It really would help me out but I got an email from my son yesterday telling me to keep up my strength up and stay out. I guess he wants as much as possible with no missing parts so to speak.

In his mid thirties and still has to even still get a M&M candy cane from me every year at Christmas just like the ones in his stocking for decades growing up. So my Thanksgiving fudge is no exception.

Thanks again for the assistance!!!!!!!!! Gobble Gobble.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

sfnative — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 20:58:34 GMT

@Mominohio

How about starting a Christmas Cookie and Candy thread in "Recipes," where favorite recipes could be shared? I'd love to bring on board new ones this year and would appreciate it. Yes, I could go to one of my dozens of cookbooks, but there's nothing like generational recipes made with love that have withstood the test of time.

My Michigan grandmother used to make white fudge made with egg whites and sugar, along with walnuts. (This medication I'm on is messing with my memory and I cannot recall what this fudge is called. I'd love a recipe for it, along with anyone's stellar toffee recipe.)

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

Fribwl — Thu, 19 Nov 2015 23:15:31 GMT

Susan in California

I am working on my shopping now and then when I put my tree up (Sat after Thanksgiving) I can then concentrate on my baking. I love to bake cookies and cakes.

i know what you mean. All of my friends don't bake anything. Not even a box cake mix.

I like to decorate cakes also ( still learning) I went to cake decorating classes and really enjoyed it. Plan on going to more classes after New Years.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

RedTop — Fri, 20 Nov 2015 00:39:05 GMT

When my girls were small, we always made sugar cookies on Christmas Eve. They loved rolling the dough, using cookie cutters, and decorating the cookies, but this tradition stopped after junior high. Outside of the one holiday dessert we decide on, I do not make any sweets for Christmas. NO cookies, cakes, candy, dipped pretzels, etc. will be found in this house.

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

homedecor1 — Fri, 20 Nov 2015 03:07:35 GMT

@Mominohio

don't know if I should say "thanks" or "oh no" because thanks to your post I decided to do a couple of cookie doughs of our fav cookies but now wondering who to give them too!

But, I do love to be in the kitchen so I made a birthday cake for a good friend. Chocolate buttercream icing with chocolate cake with strawberry filling. Oh the calories! But delicious!

Re: Christmas cookie baking started today!

Fribwl — Sat, 21 Nov 2015 22:01:10 GMT

Homedecor1

your cake looks so good. Nice job. Like I said previously, I like to bake.