A Very Merry Totoro Christmas to You!

I regret that for the majority of my life I had not watched the movie My Neighbor Totoro (となりのトトロ) the 1988 Japanese animation written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki, and produced by Studio Ghibli.  Just last year my kids and I watched it at home and thereafter I was smitten.

SPARKLY COCOA NIB CHIP BUTTER COOKIES

Happy Holidays!

CHRISTMAS IN JULY COOKIE CONTEST: Vanilla Pod Butter/Tiffany Snowflake Cookies

Christmas in July Cookie Contest!

Can you believe I've been blogging since 2007 and this is the 1st contest I'm entering?  I'm submitting my butter cookie recipe to the Eat In Eat Out 3rd Annual Christmas in July Cookie Contest

CLASSIC CHRISTMAS COOKIES: VANILLA BEAN BUTTER COOKIE RECIPE

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
¾ cup granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg white, beaten
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract (or 1 vanilla bean, ground up)
2 ½ cups sifted all-purpose flour
¾ teaspoon coarse salt
½ cup fine sanding sugar

1. Put butter and granulated sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Mix in whole egg and vanilla. Reduce speed to low. Add flour and salt and mix until combined.

2. Halve dough; shape each half into a log. Place each log on a 12-by-16 inch sheet of parchment. Roll in parchment to 1 ½ inches in diameter, pressing a ruler along edge of parchment at each turn to narrow log. Transfer to paper towel tubes to hold shape, and freeze until firm, about 1 hour.

3. Preheat oven to 375ºF. Brush each log with egg white; roll in sanding sugar. Cut into ½-inch thick rounds. Space 1 inch apart on baking sheets lined with parchment. Bake until edges are golden, 18 to 20 minutes. (cakebrain note: ensure the cookies are golden brown and they'll taste much more flavour as well as a better crunch). Let cool on sheets on wire racks. Store in airtight containers at room temperature up to 3 days.



Nothing says Christmas more than the smell of baking sugar and butter in the oven.  'Tis the season to watch the waistline spread!

This has been a tough year for me baking-wise.  There simply is no time for my fave hobby.  I do miss it so.  I have learned that I need to let go of the notion that I have to bake 8 different cookies and craft together a homemade selection of artisanal cookies and treats for my Christmas giveaways.  Not happening, folks!  Fulltime teaching, mentoring and mommying doesn't allow me to anymore!
This classic Vanilla bean butter cookie is perfectly easy.  I double a batch and keep rolls in the fridge for baking off fresh and gifting.   I make another double batch Gluten Free for myself and my GF buddies too. It is such a versatile recipe it was also used for my Tiffany Snowflake cookies pictured below.  Give it a try and don't beat yourself up if you can't make the snowflake.  It is simply gorgeous as it is packaged in cellophane bags too.   Make sure the cookies are baked until golden brown or you won't truly get that lively nutty flavour from the butter.  I like mine almost burnt but they don't look as festive.  Lol.

Merry Christmas dear readers and Happy New Year!


XMAS GIFTING IDEA (FOR THE TECH-INCLINED)
I am so geeky I sometimes surprise myself!  This batch was gifted to IT (love you guys!) and they of course know what a QR code is.  You do know what a QR code is, don't you?  If you don't know, don't attempt it because you're not tech-inclined and I'm not telling! lol  HOHOHO!

FESTIVE CHRISTMAS MACARONS

HO HO HO!  Pistachio macarons with Chestnut Cream, Vanilla Buttercream and Glace Cherry fillings.
VARIATION #1:  MATCHA-PAINTED PISTACHIO MACARONS WITH VANILLA BUTTERCREAM

Hand-painted pistachio macaron shells with buttercream filling.  The “paint” is matcha.

Follow the recipe for Pistachio macaron shells exactly.  I made two separate batches and just changed up the fillings to make my life a bit easier.
*Please hit the "read more" link to proceed to the recipes and techniques for the 3 macaron variations.

AND SO THE XMAS COOKIE BAKING FRENZY BEGINS…

     

12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS COOKIES
Here are some of my favourite Christmas Cookies and the recipes.  Click on the first picture to find the recipe post or decorating technique.   Hover your mouse over the first picture to learn the name of the cookie.  You could bake a recipe a day for the 12 days of Christmas!






 





  
MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY BAKING!

BUTTER IS BETTER

Butter makes everything better. 

Trust me.

I have 7 pounds of it in my refrigerator.  Today, with the stacks of essays and comment codes a fading memory, I am embarking on another yearly round of frenzied Christmas cookie baking.

CAKEBRAIN’S CHRISTMAS COOKIES 2009

Rudolph Sugar Cookies

From a quadruple batch of Sugar Cookie dough (from Martha Stewart’s Sugar Cookie recipe), I made a whole herd of reindeer, a veritable snowstorm of Tiffany Snowflake Cookies, and a forest of Christmas Tree cookies.   I divided up a batch of royal icing and tinted it using Teal coloured gel paste for the snowflakes and brown gel paste for the reindeer.   The reindeer noses were Wilton red-coloured candy sprinkles and the eyes were flat white confetti sprinkles coloured with a black food pen. 

This year, my chocolate flavoured cookie was  a Pierre Hermé  recipe from his book Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé.  Last year I had so much success with the beautiful Vanilla Bean Chocolate Diamonds (pictured below),
  
that I contemplated making Hermé’s Chocolate Sparklers recipe, but since I already made a batch of my slice and bake Vanilla Bean Butter Cookies, I thought it would be nice to have a piped one for the different shape.  I decided the Viennese Chocolate Sablés would be perfect.  They are piped with a large star tip ( I used Wilton 1M) and though the dough is soft, this didn’t help for ease of piping…it was pretty stiff and difficult to pipe.  I had to ensure I didn’t fill my bag too full or it became almost impossible to pipe properly.  Check the bottom of this post for the recipe.

XMAS BLING FOR OREO WREATHS

This is the lazy-man’s Christmas cookie.  I searched high and low for the White Chocolate covered Oreos I decorated with snowflakes last year, but I couldn’t find any.

Instead, these Oreo Wreaths caught my eye.  They didn’t look particularly festive so I thought I ought to add some Christmas bling to them.  I employed my new gadget:  the Cuisipro Decorator Pen to pipe the melted coloured white chocolate.  The pen was okay but white chocolate isn’t exactly the easiest product to pipe with at the best of times.  

The pen works like a syringe.  You remove the tip, pull on the syringe to suck up the melted white chocolate or whatever icing or frosting you’re using and proceed to squeeze the silicone body of the pen to get the product flowing.  Sometimes I had to push the plunger to get the chocolate coming out or to get rid of an air bubble…and I had a couple of close calls where a big blob of chocolate burst from the tip, but I had a custard cup nearby to catch the drip so it wasn’t so bad.