Yep that time of year is upon us and I’m afraid to tell you this but… it’s rapidly approaching. While I can’t help you much on present suggestions (well not unless they are for me – I like diamonds, pigs, kitchen gadgets and All-Clad) what I can help you out on are some tried and true tips to help you survive the holiday baking season.
Go through your cookbooks, recipe boxes, magazine papers you “borrowed” from your dr’s office (c’mon admin it, you’ve done it – we all have at least once or ten times in our lives. Shhh I won’t tell) and make a list of your top 10 items you want to bake. Yes 10; if you plan ahead you can make at least 10 different types which would look amazing on any cookie tray! You don’t have to make a bajillion of each; just a few dozen really. Enough for you, your family and guests. Okay.. maybe a few more for you. After all YOU baked ’em, you should be able to enjoy them!
Ingredients…
Go through your recipes and write down what all you need:
- Flour – typically most cookies call for All Purpose Flour. If a recipe calls for Self-Rising flour and you only have All Purpose, don’t panic. The only real difference between the two is Self Rising already has the leavening and salt in it. To make All Purpose flour into Self Rising, simply follow this rule of thumb. 1 cup of Self Rising flour = 1 cup of All Purpose flour plus 1 teaspoon of baking soda and 1/4 teaspoon salt. See now, that wasn’t too bad!
- Sugar (white and brown) – very few cookies I make call for dark brown sugar but it doesn’t hurt to keep a box of it on hand (and tightly sealed!)
- GOOD VANILLA not that imitation vanilla flavor crap either! I’m serious here people. I will come to your kitchen and take away your rolling pin if I find out that you bought it. You want honest-to-goodness REAL vanilla. Yes it’s pricey but you only use a little bit of it and it lasts. You wouldn’t exactly use imitation cow when eating a steak would you? Yeah, I think not 🙂
- Unsalted butter – no margarine or tub stuff. The oil content in that is too high and your cookies will have a higher tendency to burn.
- Eggs – use Large, not extra large (unless your recipe calls specifically for extra large). Also, make sure they are fresh. No, not from a chicken’s booty fresh, but not outdated.
- Baking Soda & Baking Powder – Please, please please check the expiration dates on these. Prior to starting The Kitchen Whisperer I would replace both of these every year at Christmas time. Even though they may be kept in a covered container, the ingredients will lose their potency and your cookies will not rise properly.
- Cream Cheese, fillings (preserves, icings, etc for thumbprints, pastries and so forth)
- Nuts – Look in your cabinets right now; I’ll wait. No.. seriously, go look. If you are storing nuts in anything other than the freezer or fridge, I would strongly urge you to not eat them. Why? Nuts contain fat and fat, over a period of time can go rancid.
- Decorations – Sprinkles (jimmies if you’re from Pittsburgh), dusting sugars, nonpareils, icings, food colorings, kisses and candy for cookies
- Chocolate – Chocolate chips, white chocolate chips, dark chocolate chips (I’m so in love with these right now), chocolate for melting – drizzles and dippings
- Parchment Paper – I will not bake one piece of bread, dough or cookie without it! It is a Godsend to any baker!
- Containers – You’re gonna need somewhere to house all of your hard work. Make sure they are air tight. If they aren’t and you want to use it anyway, wrap the container with plastic wrap. As Mr. Fantabulous would say “Cocoon it!”
- Baking pans/sheets, bowls, spatulas and cooling racks – make sure you have at least 2 cookie sheets. I like 3 only because it gives the one that I just took out of the oven more time to cool while I’m placing cookies on one and the last one is in the oven.
- Spices – no, I’m not talking about chili powder (which actually goes really well with chocolate) but the other spices – Cream of Tartar for Snickerdoodles, Ginger, Nutmeg, Cinnamon, all spice
Prep Work
I’ve been getting a ton of questions about “Hey, I want to get started early on my Christmas baking. Can I bake the stuff now and freeze it?” My response is “Sure you can but…” What’s the “but???” Cookies never quite taste the same after they are fully baked and then frozen/thawed. Again, even before I started TKW, I always made all of my dough (at least all of the dough that could be pre-made), shaped the cookies, flash froze them and then packaged them up with the temperature and time they take to bake them written on the package. Then the week of Christmas when we all have 9000 parties to attend, I would take out enough of each cookie I wanted to bake and pop them straight into the oven, frozen and all. You end up with a fresh, thick awesome cookie. Now granted, don’t make the dough 6 months in advance but 3 months in advance is good. Right now, with Christmas being less then a month away your cookies will be good to go.
You figure each dough takes about 15-30 minutes to prep. Make it, shape it/scoop it and then place on a parchment paper lined sheet. Pop the pan in the freezer and in about 30 minutes to an hour, take the pan out and put the partially frozen cookies into a freezer baggie. Label it and put them back into the freezer. In one night, you could easily knock out 3-4 doughs. So in 3 days you could easily make those 10 types of cookies you have on your wish list.
Baking Days
When you’re ready to start baking, look at your recipes and start off with those cookies that cook at the lowest temperature. It’s easier to start off with a cooler oven and gradually increase the heat per each cookie than the other way. You have more control over the heat. If the cookies that you’re baking require decorations (kisses for Peanut Butter Blossoms), sprinkles, colored sugars – have that stuff all ready prepped/unwrapped BEFORE you start baking.
Set up a cooling rack station and a decorating station. Have a helper if you want. Turn on some holidays tunes, light a few candles and get into the festive spirit.
Keep in mind that frozen cookies will take a tad longer than fresh-from-the-bowl cookies. So if your chocolate chip cookies take 9-11 minutes normally at 375, straight from the freezer will take 2-3 minutes longer.
Yep that time of year is upon us and I’m afraid to tell you this but… it’s rapidly approaching. While I can’t help you much on present suggestions (well not unless they are for me – I like diamonds, pigs, kitchen gadgets and All-Clad) what I can help you out on are some tried and true tips to help you survive the holiday baking season.
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