Christmas cookies start..... NOW!

 

 

 

Hi everybody! The Fresh Pioneer is back and I thought I'd try a different kind of cookie. I heard from a friend that 'horn cookies' were delicious. Okay, I'm game! And Edna's been languishing in the corner so it was perfect timing to start our sampling of Christmas cookies. (No, it's not too early! We're RESEARCHING.)

 Almonds. Fresh, unsalted, raw. YUMMY. Try not to eat them by the handful. For the recipe it calls for:
1/2 lb almonds
3/4 unsalted butter
3/4 powdered sugar
3 cups flour
1 tsp vanilla

(Again, the pictures show a lot more because... well.... six kids... and me and hungry hubby and neighbors and friends and people dropping by and... You get the idea.)

 Tiny nut grinder is hardly equipped for the job but we're going to do it in batches.

 Nut grinder is very loud! Poor kid. I see two things when I look at this picture.
One: we've been very sick and my poor four year old looks exhausted, pale, and has bags under his eyes.
Two: I should not be allowed to cut my children's hair.

 Almonds are ground and sitting prettily in their bowl...

 Putting in the butter. Edna is SOOOOOOO excited! (Again, the haircut.)

 OK, so, this was a bit of a job for her. In fact, it seems like a lot of things have gotten harder and harder for dear Edna. But she powers on...
And starts to smoke.
But she's still going, burning hot, when I turn the knob.

"But... we're not... DONE!" she wheezes.

"I know, Edna, but let's take a break." I get a cool cloth and lay it over her drive shaft. She was burning hot. And not in a good way.

I waved hubby over and gave him 'the look'. You know, the one that says, "Help me keep Edna from feeling like she's failing!"

 And being his intuitive self, he grabbed her bowl and started mixing by hand. By hand meaning WITH HIS HANDS. Edna was very quiet from her place over in the corner... Maybe she was resting. Maybe she was pouting. I was afraid to look.

 This is my child who hates his picture taken. That is all. I pretended I was taking a picture of the wall. Apparently, that made sense to his 3 year old self and he calmly waited while I snapped a photo of the blank wall behind him.
*sigh* Someone needs to hide the scissors when I saw I'm going to give everybody a haircut.

 Once we'd added all the ingredients, we were supposed to roll the dough into balls, then shape it like small crescents. Here is one child's version. I started to say, 'good job', thinking he really had tried and I was a supportive mom and all that.... but he pointed at it and said, "I made POOP!" *eye roll*

 Here is a batch of cookies before they head into the oven. I peeked over at Edna and she was still quiet, perhaps napping under her cool cloth. Her base was spattered with butter and sugar and nut dust. I had a sinking feeling that this wasn't going to end well.

The first batch came out! So delicious! But.... I swear they tasted just like the Mexican Wedding Cookies I made last year. Huh. I looked into the horn cookies and I guess they're also called Hungarian Horn Cookies and Italian Wedding Cookies! Same circus, different clowns. Still tasty.

Anyway, I came back to wipe down dear Edna and she whirred her beaters, as if to get my attention. I could feel tears welling in my eyes. I knew what she was going to say.

"I think it's time for me to retire," she said.

"No! You have lots of life left in you! It was one bad day, and those cookies were really too dry and the recipe called for way too many nuts and I always double the recipe when I shouldn't... Please, Edna, I need you. I'll have to go back to buying store bought cookies without your help. " I couldn't think of anything more to say and sniffed loudly into the silence.

"I'm not leaving. I'll stay right over there in the corner and live the good life of frostings and meringues." Her voice wasn't unkind. And she didn't seem sad.

OH! I wiped my eyes. "So... we should be shopping for another mixer?"

"Absolutely. But promise me one thing."

"Anything!" I was so happy. It was the best case scenario. Edna was staying and we would add to our little kitchen family with a heavy duty mixer that could handle all sorts of menial jobs.

"Let me choose, okay?" Her chrome twinkled in the sunlight.

And I was happy to agree. So, maybe by next week there will be another friend to introduce. Will it be

something like this?

Or this?

Or, since we have so many kids, should we go this route?

And then a friend sent me this picture from a shop near her house.

"Oooooh," Edna said. "Is that a retirement community?"

So, we'll see what she chooses and I'm excited to be baking with BOTH of them in the Christmas season! Until next time!

SEASON OF HOPE is now available!! Check it out here...

Mexican Wedding Cookies

Hello everybody! The Fresh Pioneer is back and I've got a recipe that EVERYONE already knows. No use in that, is there?

 

But still. I love these cookies. And I've found that although everyone knows them, they're not always called by the same name. So... Mexican wedding cookies, or snowballs, or pfeffernussen, or Russian teacakes, they're all delicious. And simple. And I get to bring Edna out of her corner to play.

First, we grate the walnuts. Look at these boys. They love the power tools. Hate the noise. Obviously my little chopper sounds a bit louder than "Eggna", which is what they both call her.

And this is my friend, Jackie. her mom is my co-teacher at our church. (Thank goodness for Patty. On those days she's gone, the kids almost eat me alive.)

 

Anyway, Jackie came for a playdate one day. Here she is meeting Edna. Jackie is a born artist and writer. A few years ago, I got to read a story she wrote about a day in the third grade. It had so much detail I could have SWORN I was eating a chili dog in the cafeteria. I used some of her cafeteria details in my book 'Season of Joy'. And I named my heroine Calista's ultra-capable personal assistant after Jackie. If you read it carefully, you can SEE JACKIE.

 

And then she read my book and told me she liked it.  *swoon* We have a mutal admiration society going...

 

Anyway, back to cooking!

  

The recipe is simplicity itself. 1 cup walnuts, chopped. 1tsp vanilla. 1 cup butter. 6 TBS powdered sugar. 2 cups flour. All together. Like so.

The dough looks strangely crumbly, but squeeze it into small balls, about one inch or a bit larger. My kids always complain about how small they are, so I've learned to make them about 1.5 inches. Nice cookie size.

350F on an ungreased cookie sheet for 12 minutes. I was making these one night when one of my husband's relatives popped over. She said you shouldn't roll them in the powdered sugar until they're cool. But I learned to roll them once when they're hot, and once when they're cool. It makes a nice layer of powdered sugar.

Oooo, pretty. I got these dishes at a junk shop when it was 'free glasswares' day. Can you believe it? Of course, they were dirty and dusty, but look how clean and lovely they are now? Edna welcomed them to the kitchen with a grand whirring of the beaters. The more the merrier!

And a sweet Fireking mug from the same batch of 'junk' We just don't ever use that word, here. It's a fine line between junk and treasure. Sometimes all you need is a little soap and water... and Russian Teacakes.

So, pull up a chair and share some stories. You can make them up, we don't care. In fact, we prefer that kind. Especially the ones about 3rd grade cafeteria chili dogs.
Until next time!