Living on Less – Holiday Treats
The holidays are the time when people who normally don’t bake, make the time to bake cookies, breads and make fudge and other candy treats. If money is tight and you are cutting back on expenses, you can still prepare holiday treats for your family without breaking the bank. The key is to not go overboard in making a lot of different things.
Stick to 4 things: two kinds of cookies, one kind of candy and one kind of snack mix. After you have selected those 4 things, don’t make them until a couple of days before Christmas. I know, it goes against everything everyone seems to do now. Many people make several kinds of cookies and candies several weeks before Christmas, we see overloaded trays of all sorts of items, but is it really necessary to have so much variety in order to celebrate the holidays? I say no.
You can still make holiday baking special on a frugal budget. Bake two kinds of cookies – perhaps sugar cut out cookies that the kids can help you decorate and perhaps peanut butter blossom cookies. It’s not the variety that makes Christmas special, it’s the fact that you may only make cut out sugar cookies and peanut butter blossoms only at Christmas that makes them special.
When I think of Christmas baking I automatically think of cut out sugar or butter cookies that have icing on them and sprinkles. That is Christmas to me. I use a butter cookie recipe as it holds its shape better during the baking process, but butter is expensive. If money is tight you can substitute a good quality margarine for the butter. I buy butter when it is on sale and I keep it in the freezer.
This is my grandmother’s recipe. She was born in 1900 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, into a very, very poor immigrant family. She was a wonderful lady and a great cook.
Butter Cookies
2 cups butter (yes, that would be 1 lb. butter) – to stretch the butter you can use half butter and half margarine – do not use “diet” margarine, or replace the butter with a good quality margarine
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 egg
4 ¼ cups sifted flour
In a large bowl cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Blend in vanilla and egg. Gradually blend in flour. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Working with about ¼ of the dough at a time and on a well floured board, roll out the cookie dough to about 1/8” thickness. With floured cookie cutters, cut to desired shapes. Place on baking sheets and bake for 6 to 9 minutes or until edge of cookies are brown. (Okay, grandma baked these in an old cook stove so that is why there is quite a variation in baking time. Just time the first batch and go from there.)
Remove cookies and cool and frost with a powdered sugar icing. Take some powdered sugar and add almond or vanilla flavoring and some milk to get it to a consistency that you can either drizzle or lightly frost the cookies. Then sprinkle with holiday cookie sprinkles.
Another idea is to make Fantasy Fudge, using chocolate chips and marshmallow crème, and for a snack mix you can make Chex mix. Besides the two types of cookies you will be making you now have four things that will make a nice selection for the holidays and they won’t cost a lot of money to do. Remember that when you go to purchase your baking supplies, you can save money by buying items on sale and also by using store brands. If you didn’t do it this year, next year beginning in October, start stocking up a little at time on holiday baking supplies as they go on sale.
There are a few benefits to limiting the amount of treats you make at the holidays. It is less stressful and baking close to Christmas ensures that you will have treats on Christmas day which makes Christmas special.
Giving a gift of a home baked item to individuals is always welcomed, but again you can choose recipes that have a lot of different ingredients and are costly. Spending a lot is not necessary when it comes to making treats to give away. Instead of pumpkin bread I bake a Cinnamon Quick Bread. At this time of year, it seems like there is a lot of pumpkin bread being baked so I choose to do something a little different. Cinnamon is one spice that nearly everyone loves. BTW – I purchase cinnamon in bulk but the “5th Season” brand sold at Wal-mart for only 50 cents is a good deal.
Cinnamon Quick Bread
1 1/3 cups granulated sugar (divided)
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 egg, beaten
1 cup milk
1/3 cup vegetable oil
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a 9 x 5” loaf pan. (You can also make this using mini loaf pans, adjust the baking time though.) Mix 1/3 cup of the sugar and the cinnamon together and set aside. Combine the flour, baking powder, salt and the remaining 1 cup of sugar in a large bowl. Combine egg, milk and oil and add to the flour mixture. Stir by hand until moistened. Pour half of the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Sprinkle with half the cinnamon sugar mixture. Repeat with remaining batter and cinnamon mixture, then draw a knife through the batter to swirl. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan for 10 minutes, then remove and cool on a wire rack. Wrap and store bread overnight before slicing.
Cardamom bread is on the left.
I have a signature bread that I give away at Christmas time. It is a yeast braided bread and it takes some time to make, but it is very, very good. I am Swedish and I grew up in a Swedish community in Western New York. (As a side note, my hometown has about 4 feet of snow right now.) I bake this “Cardamom Braid” at Christmas to give away to friends and family. Yeast breads can be more frugal as a yeast bread doesn’t call for as much sugar as a Quick Bread. You can buy Ground Cardamom in the local grocery store with all of the other Tones spices. Anytime I give this bread to someone they always marvel at the flavor of the bread as they can’t quite figure out what the spice is.
Swedish Cardamom Coffee Braid
1 pkg. yeast
¼ cup warm water
1 cup scalded milk
½ cup sugar
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup butter or margarine
1 teaspoon ground cardamom
About 4 cups flour
Soften the yeast in the water. Pour the scalded milk over the sugar, salt, butter and cardamom. Cool to lukewarm and stir in the yeast mixture. Work in flour to make a soft dough. Knead until smooth. Place in a greased bowl, turn once, and let rise until doubled. Turn out on a floured board and divide dough in half. Then take each half and divide into three equal parts. Shape each part into a strip about 16 inches long. Braid the three strips together for each coffee braid, tucking the ends underneath. Place on a greased baking sheet, cover and let rise, about 1 hour. Then brush with topping mixture and sprinkle with sugar and sliced almonds (I usually omit the almonds). Bake at 350 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes.
Topping:
1 egg yolk mixed with two tablespoons water.
