Recipe Tuesday :: A British Christmas with Mince Pies, Tea and Books

That was the theme of this Christmas for me this year.  Everything was quite English.  Mom got me a years worth of tea, two teapots, a box filled with treats including turkish delight, mince pies and a figgy pudding (!) and more than half a dozen books.  Then we went and visited my uncle and family and the theme continued with my very own Teatantic, lavender tea, biscuits, a Tardis mug and a table runner made by my aunt that featured British fabric on one side and Paris on the other!  I also got a couple of kitchen tools to help me make cupcakes, which I am taking as a not so subtle hint that the people are clambering for more!

I did overfill my days up to Christmas as usual and thanks to some inspiration from my December issue of Country Homes and Interiors (I mean, look at that cover!  Isn't the whole thing inspiring?!)  we decided to make our own mincemeat for pies this year!  After searching through many traditional recipes that called for suet (yeah, the stuff we Americans feed to birds in the winter) I found a one that didn't have any and was cranberry based.  What's more Christmas-y than cranberries?  So Mom and I tried this one by Nigella Lawson and it didn't seem to bad.  It set up nicely and was the consistency you're usually looking for in mince pies.

But when Mom gave it a whiff the next morning she wanted something that smelled more like the mincemeat she's used to from the jar.  Something with apple.  Enter Mary Berry!  I'd say she's something like Martha Stewart in Britain, though mostly food and not so much crafting.  Her mincemeat recipe subbed butter for the suet, because really fat is fat, just choose your favorite.  Now that was a recipe Mom could get behind.  There was of course plenty of tweaking, so with no further ado....

Cindy's Apple Mince Pie Filling

4 cups diced apples (Pippin or Jonagold or your favorite pie apple)
2 1/2 cups golden raisins
1 1/4 cups raisins
1 cup Craisins
2 mandarin oranges or clementines, zest and juice
1/2 cup butter (one stick), cut into cubes
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp nutmeg
3 Tbsp corn syrup (lite or regular)
2 Tbsp brandy
1/4 cup dark rum
1 cup water

Put the apples, raisins, golden raisins, Craisins, orange zest and juice and butter in a large pot.  Heat gently over medium heat while stirring until the butter is melted.  Add water, sugars and spices and stir to combine.  Add corn syrup and starch and stir to combine.  Simmer for 10 to 20 minutes until the apples are cooked through and soft and the mixture is thickened.  Add more water to prevent burning as needed, but add it tablespoon by tablespoon.  Remove from heat and let cool.  Add brandy and rum once cooled and mix well.  You can put the mixture in jars with lids and keep in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.  To use in pies or tarts just make or buy your favorite pie dough and bake accordingly.

Cranberry Mincemeat to the left, Mom's Mincemeat to the right

We of course shared them with all the family that we got to see at my uncle's the day after Christmas. I had also wanted to make some chocolate cookies with peppermint Hershey kisses stuck in the top, but ran out of time the day before.  So I took all the ingredients down with me, printed out this recipe and baked them there!  They were quite a hit and because my uncle is allergic to eggs I subbed yogurt for the eggs (about a spoonful and a half).  Couldn't tell the difference in my opinion and they were delicious!

I did get to end my holiday sitting around, watching movies and Doctor Who and knitting, which is exactly how I wanted to spend it.  Hope your holidays were enjoyable!

Recipe Tuesday :: Pineapple Coconut Bars and Christmas

These are the easiest recipe to make for a Christmas party!  Which is just what I did of course.  Our lab party was a couple of weekends ago now, but I can tell you they were a hit.  I've been slowly making my way through some of those Pinterest recipes and I loved this one.


The crust came together quickly in the food processor and was baked before adding the pineapple topping.

Which I did alter by one ingredient.  My secret ingredient in all things pineapple.  An extra dash of pineapple flavoring (thank you King Arthur Flour).

The pineapple topping was baked (a little too long because I burnt it on the edge a bit) and then a delicious glaze made with coconut extract was drizzled on the top.

Check out my festive tea towel!  I saw it at the gift shop at the hospital I work at and I couldn't pass it up.  Doesn't it just make you feel warm and Christmas-y inside?  It was a good thing this recipe was quick, easy and delicious (which are all good things) because it was what I needed.  That weekend was our last weekend off before Christmas and we packed it full.  On Saturday it was the Christmas party, which was a ton of fun.

We played Heads Up! and had a gift exchange and ate yummy food and passed Emily's baby around. It was enjoyable to let your fun side show and socialize without looking at the clock thinking about how you should be getting back to work.  And as always, Akbar's house was beautiful.

Then on Sunday, Mom and I went up to my alma mater, Central Washington University, to see The Nutcracker.  It was put on jointly by the local dance school, Central's Orchesis dance company and the Theatre Ensemble there at the college.  Two dancers from Ballet Idaho were featured as the Sugar Plum Fairy and the Nutcracker Prince.  It was fantastic! The students were really good and the costumes beautiful and it was fun to see a different group perform, rather than the same one we see almost every year in Yakima.  I had also wanted to go to Leavenworth and see the Christmas lights up there and since we were in Ellensburg it was only an hour away.  But I'd forgotten my camera at home.  So I told Mom either we could just go up there without it, just eat in Ellensburg and go home and forget it, or go home and get the camera and go all they way back up.  Yeah, we chose the last option because we are nuts.

But the pictures are so pretty!  It was cold and foggy, but no real snow yet up there.  They had a portion of the park covered with man-made snow that had turned to ice so the kids could sled.  We ate dinner and checked out the shops, buying a few things, and then we stopped in to a bakery and picked up some treats along with hot apple cider.  I was hoping to get some roasted chestnuts but the stands were all closed.  :(

But we did spot Santa and Mrs. Claus wandering around for pictures!  You win some, you lose some.

This was our favorite shop that was decorated!  So pretty!

And Mom loved this tree.  Those snowflakes were huge!

We actually only just got our Christmas tree decorated today.  We had picked it up that weekend and it was just sitting in the living room being watered and sad that it wasn't decorated yet.  We are getting ourselves together though to spend some time just enjoying our days off.  Stollen bread is baked, cinnamon rolls too and I still need to wrap Mom's presents tomorrow (which has become a tradition for me).  But soon it will be time to give up those things left undone and enjoy family and friends and celebrate how much we love each other!  Merry Christmas!

Recipe Tuesday :: Nutella Rugelach

Happy Hanukkah!  Now that may seem like a strange opening line for me because I'm Catholic, but let me explain.  See my mother enjoys everything religious and a few years ago she got really into celebrating Jewish holidays.  She says that we should be celebrating those as well as our Christian ones because without the Jewish religion we wouldn't have Christianity.  That seems plausible enough and in a more normal household it probably would have stopped at acknowledging those holidays in a small way but not this one.  Mom went all out.  She bought a menorah...from Israel.  And last year I got her a book how to learn Hebrew.  We buy chocolate coins and play dreidel for them.  And in the past few years we've celebrated we've gotten used to a few traditions of our own.  One of those is rugelach.  These small crescent cookies filled with Nutella goodness will make anyone a convert.  The best recipe I've found is by Rachel Phipps which you can find here at her blog (which I just noticed is from England, you know, where all good things come from!).

So first we made the dough and rolled it out...

Then slathered it in Nutella...

Sprinkled it with pecans...

Cut it and rolled them up!

Mom threw them in the oven...

And then remembered to sprinkle the tops with some coarse sugar, so they came out magically covered!

Some years it's harder to celebrate Hanukkah because it's either early in December or later and running through Christmas, but this year it is perfect!  Tonight is the first night and the last night is December 24th, so if you want to join in the celebration that Jesus and his parents and family celebrated more than 2,000 years ago please do!  You don't even have to have a menorah, just nine lights that you light adding one each night until they are all lit.  There are some great ideas for DIY projects like this one or this one.  You can go all Martha Stewart, or you can do it modern, or country or manly.  There are toddler proof ones and fun ones to do with your kids.  It's really all about taking a moment to be quiet and thankful for the blessings we've been given and people that surround us.  And if you want to expand your spiritual life and read about Hanukkah this is a great site to get you started.  I think looking outside ourselves is important and it can deepen our own spiritual life to learn about others.  And if you're not into any of that, still try the rugelach!  As Mom said, "Nothing with Nutella is bad."