Christmas cookie marathon

I didn't do a post last weekend because I didn't do much except clean my refrigerator. I contemplated posting a picture of my clean refrigerator, but I felt that no one would appreciate its beauty quite as much as I did.

Yesterday was our Christmas cookie marathon. I made the sugar cookie, chocolate sugar cookie, and Mexican wedding cake doughs in advance. Jane did the dough for the sour cream pockets and also made Tom Thumbs (coconut bars) and caramels. The caramels came out pretty soft. When I visited her Monday, we chilled them so we could cut them and wrap them in wax paper. Hilda prepped the pecan bars using a new recipe from America’s Test Kitchen.

I was up early making frosting. I made my usual buttercream frosting, debating in my head about single or double batch. I decided on a single batch, but left the butter out at room temperature so I could whip up more if I needed to. I made a new recipe for chocolate frosting using the recipe on the Ghiradelli cocoa package. It turned out rather runny. I put in some extra cocoa and hoped for the best.

At 10:00, Kate arrived with her cat, Gracie. Kate was leaving for Oshkosh that day, and I offered to set up a kennel where Gracie could lounge in relative comfort while we were baking. That would save Kate two hours of driving back to her townhouse to get the cat. Even though I explained the plan to Terry, he still suffered from the misconception that Gracie was going to stay with us until Kate got back after Christmas. Apparently he could not believe we would set up the kennel, complete with food, water, and a litter box for a couple of hours. “Why didn’t she just stay in her carrier?” he asked.

“What if she had to pee?” I answered. (It turned out she didn’t, but she managed to get litter in the water bowl anyway.)

Jane drove in shortly after we had the cat settled in. Hilda passed out aprons and towels to hang on the apron strings. Here is Kate, suited up and ready to go.

Kate with her apron and towel. By the end of the day, she decided she loved aprons. Very handy for hand wiping.

As we got organized, Hilda baked her pecan bars. We were intrigued by this recipe because it did not require making caramel as a separate step. Melting sugar without burning it always gave me anxiety. We had to start over more than once, let me tell you. Also, the base did not need pre-baking. It only went in the oven once, completely assembled. Here is the result. It tasted just like pecan pie.

Pecan bars

I started rolling and cutting the sugar cookies so we could get the frosting on in time to set up before Kate had to leave. Kate brought along her two cookie cutters, a penguin and a horse. I found that the penguin’s flippers and the horse’s tail and legs were points of weakness. After a few unfortunate accidents, I reverted to my tried and true Christmas bison with their stubby legs and thick necks. Much more structurally sound.

Horse/bison comparison. The more structurally sound shape is easy to discern

Kate put the cookies on the trays.

Cookies on the tray (including the "dog cookie" from the end of the chocolate cookies)

Hilda manned the oven.

Hilda takes cookies out of the oven

Jane took the cookies off the trays.

Jane puts cookies on the cooling rack

When the first cookies were cool enough, Jane started putting chocolate frosting on the bison and Kate started with the white frosting on the penguins, snowmen, and boys and girls. Kate was nervous because she was a frosting novice. We assured her that most folks just ate the cookies without criticizing the artwork.

Kate uses a pallet knife for the first time.

Aren't the penguins cute?

When I was done rolling and cutting, I prepared the colored icing in the piping bags. Kate learned to pipe frosting too. It was a day of growth experiences for her.

All frosted!

The Christmas bison get a wreath around their necks to make them festive

When the cookies were all frosted, we took a break for lunch. I made turkey soup with homemade noodles.

Two kinds of cookies were left, the Mexican wedding cakes and the sour cream pockets. We did the wedding cakes first because they were less putzy. When they were in the oven, I started rolling the sour cream pocket dough. Jane dabbed on a tiny bit of apricot or raspberry filling and folded up the corners. And the corners mostly came apart in the oven, but they will still taste good. We convinced Kate to stay just a little longer so she could take some with her. By this time, I had (typically) forgotten all about taking pictures. Trust me, they cookies were beautiful.

After Kate left, we cleaned up, packed our share of the cookies, and had a cup of coffee. It was such a fun day, and we have delicious things to eat. What could be better?