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| Hazelnut cinnamon biscotti await 2nd baking |
It is a busy time of the year and I completed two days of charity baking. I bake cookies for the library and the church "cookie walks." Before moving here I never had heard of a cookie walk, but it is a sale where customers are given trays and or boxes to fill, selecting the cookies they want from massive arrays on tables. Customers walk around the tables, ponder, select and then have their selections weighed and pay for them, the cookies sell for $6 per pound. This way customers get an array of their own choosing and because of walking around the display tables, this is known as a "cookie walk".
My contributions this year are almond sandies, and three kinds of biscotti. I am gaining a reputation for making the best and unusual biscott's, something many here in this small town had not heard of nor baked, and something most adults adore. I prefer making cookies for adults, having no small children around. My flavors this year are hazelnut cinnamon, hazelnut vanilla, peppermint candy cane drizzled with chocolate; the hazelnut is winning because we buy mixed nuts for snacks and Jerry always picks the hazelnuts (filberts) aside, leaving a big collection of these when the container of mixed nuts is gone. I have started to chop them and bake with them as there are too many for me to eat and or put into my martini or gimlet, another practice I'd never heard of until we moved here. When I would order a gimlet (which I prefer light on the gimlet and heavier on the vodka) because few bartenders around here can make my favorite Cosmo, I recall the first time the bartender asked me " with or without nuts?" I thought he was kidding, he was not. It seems filberts are placed into gimlets much like I used to use olives or slices of lime. I never heard of that before. Oh the things I have learned since moving to MN!
The first photo above is the vanilla hazelnut biscotti logs cut and ready for the 2nd baking. I discovered a wonderfully easy recipe for biscotti and have adapted it to many different flavors always with success. What I once would never have considered baking has become a breeze for me. The time to bake these cookies twice in order to give them the hardness needed for dunking into coffee or tea is discouraging to many would be bakers. But having mastered it, I feel like a wizard.
You might want this recipe and I share it but I warn you I never follow a recipe exactly. I credit my grandmother Rose for my creativity, she never measured either. So I adapt and modify and if I get an idea for a different flavor I add it. I usually always use twice the amount of vanilla in any recipe. Here is my basic Biscotti Recipe which I modify with nuts, chocolate chips, peppermint candies crushed and you name it I try it. You should be able to click on this photo of the recipe and enlarge it. It is one that will go into my "Cookbook of Favorites by Family, Friends and Myself ."
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Just inside and ahead in the Christmas closet
You cannot see to the left nor full floor to ceiling |
This year I have limited my interior decorating because although I have a massive collection of everything Christmas, and I love to have my accumulations on display, I detest taking them all down after holiday and packing them away. I am fortunate to have an immense walk in closet downstairs devoted strictly to ornamentals. I have shelves floor to ceiling and can store the items in big plastic bins which allow me to see what is inside. You name it and I likely have it, everything from train sets, fat friars caroling on a goat drawn cart, to Dickens village buildings, Christmas in the City displays, stuffed animals, different adornments for kitchen and throughout the home, different Santa's, elves, my hundreds of angels, different nativity sets and a massive collection of Fontannini figurines, and on and on. Since there is no one to "leave this collection to" when the market rebounds I will begin to sell it off, a lesson I learned from an elderly woman in CA whose family did not appreciate her treasures. She was selling it off and enjoying spending the proceeds, and the buyers were pleased to acquire.
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Sitting elf (1940's) with shopping
elf, 1990's.
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For the first time in how long, this year I declined assemblage of our massive 7 1/2 foot fiber optic tree for which Jerry was grateful as that is his chore to unbox and assemble. I just did not want to face the taking down and packing away of ornaments. It is a sight to behold, but I felt we could pass this year.
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1967 Fontannini Nativity Musical; very rare
Fontannin no longer makes musicals to my knowledge.
Tinsel is my addition this year
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The nativity set always comes out first and this year I have two, the oldest Fontannini we bought our first Christmas in 1967 and the newest Royal Doulton. I also put three ceramic magi in the bedroom, made by that same elderly woman who was selling off her collections in CA. The Magi stay out until mid January as was a tradition with my Polish culture--Epiphany, which seems to come earlier in the church calendar. Of course back when I grew up we always had real trees, put up Christmas Eve and displayed until New Years. Traditions have shifted now to decorating right after Thanksgiving and removal the day after Christmas. One year in CA I left our tree up until the weekend after New Years and friends did not know what to think.
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1940's Elf discoverd at Uncle Carl's
in PA; likely belonged to Aunt Marge
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Last year I displayed the angels for the first time in several years and this year I decided to display some of the elves. I noticed that elves are making a comeback in the commercial world. I have some which I consider vintage, from the 40's and now replicas are on the market, likely made in China. I am taking pride that this year in our home there is nothing on display made in China; my collection is too old for that! For example, there is a book "Elf on the Shelf", being sold today with an elf who does who knows what. Well I have the original 1940's red dressed little guy who was taken out of his box this year and displayed upstairs alongside one who took up residence maybe 5years ago, handmade here by a local lady. The red dressed impish guy sitting in this photo has a celluloid face and was made in this country, way back when we used to manufacture and sell to ourselves. Then "made in Japan" began to overtake US manufacturing. I have a tale to tell which I will do on the next post about the mischief the elves have gotten into, though as with myself, it really was not all their fault! That post is next to come!
