It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Stephanie Doig – Chocolate Ginger Cookies

It’s not often I add a cookie recipe to my Christmas cookie list. My family has a really solid cookie tradition, and I won’t mess with that for just any cookie. I tried this one out a couple of years ago, though, and it’s been requested every year since. They’re a little bit more work than the average cookie, but they’re worth it! One warning: you have to like ginger to like these cookies—and I mean you have to REALLY like ginger. They pack a punch.- Stephanie Doig, Editorial Assistant, Digital Publishing

Ingredients:

1.5 cups flour

1 1/4 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp cloves

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1 tbsp cocoa powder

1/2 cup butter, softened for 30-45 minutes

1 tbsp freshly grated peeled ginger (make sure you get the fresh stuff–woody ginger does not look appealing in a cookie. J )

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup molasses

1 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 tsp boiling water

200 grams semi-sweet chocolate, chopped OR 200 grams of semi-sweet chocolate chips

1/4 cup granulated sugar

Directions:

In medium bowl, mix together flour, ground ginger, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and cocoa. Set aside.

In large bowl, use an electric mixer to beat butter and ginger four about four minutes. (If you don’t have an electric mixer, just use your arm muscles!)

Add brown sugar and molasses, beating until combined.

In a small bowl, stir together baking soda and boiling water until baking soda is dissolved.

Beat half of the flour mixture into the butter mixture, then add the baking soda/water and stir together. Add the rest of the flour mixture. Fold in chocolate chunks/chips.

Chill dough in fridge for two hours/overnight. (I know it’s tempting to skip this step, but it really does make them easier to handle.)

Preheat oven to 325. Form chilled dough into balls, then roll them in granulated sugar. Place on baking sheet about 2 inches apart.

Bake for 10-12 minutes. They’ll be ready when the surfaces begin to crack.

Makes approximately 2 dozen cookies.

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Angela James Easy Christmas “Cookie”–Cracker Candy

Note: I originally posted this recipe nearly 3 years ago in 2009. It’s probably the single most popular post on my personal website, and I still get people asking me about this recipe, sharing the link and talking about making the cracker candy. It’s just that easy to make and just that good. So I decided to pull it back to the top for all of you who never saw it the first time. In the comments are discussions for variations, and I’ve tried them all, including the club crackers, adding crushed candy canes, etc. Honestly, my favorite cracker candy is still the kind that’s just the saltines and chocolate, not even any nuts on top. But this is a forgiving recipe, so experiment and find your own favorite way!

I think most of you are going “uh…what?”. I had never heard of cracker candy until about 7 years ago, when we did our first cookie exchange for our playgroup. My friend Jennifer did this for the exchange and I fell so madly in love with it. It’s probably just about the easiest Christmas cookie you can make (it took me twice as long to write this post as it did to make the actual candy) and super tasty.I have, in the past, made these and sent them to people who think I’m crazy when I talk about them. But the combination of the salty cracker and the butter/sugar that turns into a toffee, with the sweetness of the chocolate is so addictive! Here’s how to do it, complete with (bad) photos.

Spread out your crackers in on a jelly roll/cookie sheet pan. One with edges that you’ve lined completely with foil. Trust me on this, line the pan with foil. I decided to do a mix of soda crackers and club crackers, because I thought the buttery taste of the club crackers might be divine in this recipe.

Melt the butter, add the sugar and bring to a boil for at least three minutes. It may take a bit longer, but you’ll see it thicken and get a bit more gooey. I think there’s an official candy-making term for this. Soft ball stage? I don’t know, I’m totally making crap up now.

Warning!! Do NOT walk away from your pot. You must stand and stir the entire time or you’ll end up with a huge mess on your stove and probably burnt butter and sugar.

Pour the butter mixture over the crackers. All over the crackers. You won’t be able to get them all coated just by pouring, you’re going to have to pour it as evenly as you can (I didn’t do that and made it a little harder on myself) and then go back and spread it out with a spoon.

It should look like this, all cracker surfaces covered with butter goo. Now put the crackers in the oven on 400 degrees for 5 minutes. Set a timer. You’ll be ticked if you leave them in too long and burn them. And that can happen.

While your crackers are in the oven, grab your commercial-size can of cashews–what do you mean you don’t have one? Everyone has one, right? Well, anyway, at this stage, if you’re going to use nuts like pecans, walnuts or cashews, even peanuts, you’re going to want to chop them up.

Like this. I used my handy countertop Black and Decker chopper. You’ll see this featured a lot in my cooking posts. I just chopped the cashews until they were appropriate for topping. I use cashews because I like them best, but you can use whatever you want. A cup of cashews unchopped resulted in enough chopped cashews for the entire pan of cracker candy.

Here’s a shot of the crackers in the oven. This was longer than five minutes because I had to run upstairs and tuck Brianna in.

I pulled them out of the oven, see how they look kind of brown? That’s not bad, but you don’t really want them to get any darker than that. Don’t try to go for any particular color. Just bake them for five minutes and pull them out.

Now sprinkle the chocolate chips over as soon as you pull them from the oven. I also had an industrial size bag of dark chocolate chips (hey, I shop at Sam’s Club) so I had to guess at how many to put on, but it’s hard to have too much chocolate. I use dark because it’s my favorite. The chips will begin to melt immediately, but get them sprinkled on and then worry about spreading. You have lots of time. I spread one side out, the other side looks like they’re still formed but really they’re melted too. Spread the chocolate evenly. I had to move some around because I had a bare spot after I was done.

Look to see if anyone is around.

Lick the spatula. You’re done with it, it’s okay. Now put it in the sink and wipe the chocolate off the corner of your mouth. Be glad no one saw you.

At this point, you can just leave your cracker candy naked. You don’t have to do anything more to it if you don’t want. You can be done now.

I added cashews to only half, because I do like naked cracker candy too. Instead of adding nuts, this year Jennifer added Christmas color candy sprinkles to hers. I almost put some fancy sea salt on one corner of this, because dark chocolate and sea salt? Yum. But I didn’t want to get the salt out (I’m lazy).

Now the hard part. Waiting. Let it cool in the fridge or freezer. Possibly overnight on the counter if it’s cool in your house, but you might need to stash it in the freezer for a few minutes to firm it up. You don’t want the chocolate to be soft at all. You want it totally set. Now break it apart. You can be anal and break it into the cracker squares, or you can just break it into random pieces. It really doesn’t matter. It all tastes the same. Addictive. Oh, and next time? I’m making them all with club crackers. The extra buttery taste made them insane!

Cracker Candy

35-40 Saltines
2 sticks of salted butter -do NOT use margarine
1/4 cup sugar
1 bag of milk (or semi or dark) chocolate morsels
Sliced almonds or any other nuts

Line cookie sheet with foil (sides too). Lay saltines side by side in one layer, sides touching. Melt butter, add sugar and boil 3 minutes. Drizzle over crackers, (keep crackers together). Bake 5 minutes @ 400°. Remove from oven and sprinkle chocolate over baked crackers. They will start to melt – spread over crackers. Sprinkle top with nuts. Refrigerate until cold, even overnight. Break into pieces.

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Name: Stephanie Doig – Grandma’s Date Squares

My grandmother was a wonderful cook. She and my grandfather lived on a farm, and every day she cooked full meals for Grandpa, my dad and my uncle, as well as the farmhands. This summer I was going through Grandma’s old recipe cards, copying down any recipes I remembered fondly or that looked particularly well-used. I could tell at a glance which were her favourites—they were so spattered and worn around the edges (sometimes burned around the edges, presumably from close calls with the stovetop) that I could barely read them. There were comments on some of the cards. Some recipes were labeled “good,” some “very good,” and a rare few “extra good.” This is an “extra good.”- Stephanie Doig, Editorial Assistant, Digital Publishing

Ingredients:

Filling:

1 lb dates, pitted and chopped

3/4 cup hot water

1/4 cup sugar

pinch salt

1 tsp vanilla

Base/topping: 1 cup flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 cups rolled oats

1 cup brown sugar

3/4 cup cold butter

Directions:

In medium bowl, mix flour, baking soda, rolled oats and brown sugar. Cut in cold butter using pastry cutter or two knives. Press half of this mixture into a 9×9 baking pan. Set aside.

In saucepan over medium heat, bring filling ingredients to a boil. Stir and boil until mixture has thickened. Remove from heat and spread the filling over the base.

Pat the remaining half of the flour mixture on top.

Bake in 350-degree oven for 20-25 minutes. Enjoy!

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Carrie Holden’s Roasted Cauliflower and Cheddar Soup

A creamy cauliflower soup with thyme.

Servings: 4+ servings

Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 50 minutes
Total Time: 60 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 small head cauliflower, cut into florets
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, chopped
• 1 tablespoon fresh thyme, chopped
• 1 cup skim milk
• 3 cups vegetable broth (or 1 ½ cups vegetable broth, 1 ½ cups water)
• 1 ½ cups cheddar cheese, shredded
• 3 tablespoons oil
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Toss the cauliflower florets in 2 tbsp. oil and season with salt and pepper in a large baking sheet.
2. Roast the cauliflower in a pre-heated 400F oven until lightly golden brown, about 20-30 minutes.
3. Heat the remaining oil in a saucepan over medium heat.
4. Add the onion and sauté until tender, about 5-7 minutes.
5. Add garlic and thyme and sauté until fragrant, about one minute.
6. Add the vegetable broth and cauliflower and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes.
7. Hand blend the soup until smooth consistency.
8. Add the cheese, let it melt and season with salt and pepper.
9. Mix in the milk and remove from heat.

Serve and enjoy with a slice of crusty bread!

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Angela James- Ham and potato soup

Every year, Josh’s work gives them either a ham or a turkey for the holiday season. “A” ham actually is two hams. Big-ass hams, like 8 to 10 pounds each. So it’s a lot of ham for three people. I made one this past weekend but…did I mention it’s a lot of ham for three people? Leftovers. I froze part of it with the bone, so I can make ham and beans at some point, but last night I made Ham and potato soup. A super easy, really amazingly delicious ham and potato soup from allrecipes.com. If you look at the recipe, you’ll see by the ratings that I’m not the only one who thought so.

Most of you know that I usually change the recipes somehow, but this time I followed the recipe exactly (well, I put in more ham but that doesn’t count). But the recipe is perfect–and did I mention easy? as is.

INGREDIENTS

* 3 1/2 cups peeled and diced potatoes
I lied. I changed this. Hate cooked celery. I omitted.
* 1/3 cup finely chopped onion
* 3/4 cup diced cooked ham
* 3 1/4 cups water
* 2 tablespoons chicken bouillon granules
* 1/2 teaspoon salt, or to taste
* 1 teaspoon ground white or black pepper, or to taste
* 5 tablespoons butter
* 5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
* 2 cups milk

DIRECTIONS

1. Combine the potatoes, celery, onion, ham and water in a stockpot. Bring to a boil, then cook over medium heat until potatoes are tender, about 10 to 15 minutes. Stir in the chicken bouillon, salt and pepper.
2. In a separate saucepan, melt butter over medium-low heat. Whisk in flour with a fork, and cook, stirring constantly until thick, about 1 minute. Slowly stir in milk as not to allow lumps to form until all of the milk has been added. Continue stirring over medium-low heat until thick, 4 to 5 minutes.
3. Stir the milk mixture into the stockpot, and cook soup until heated through. Serve immediately.

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Eleanor Elliott’s Spaghetti Squash Au Gratin

This is an alternative to scalloped potatoes for anyone looking to reduce carbs (or, those who just love yummy side-dishes!)- Eleanor Elliott, Director, Digital Capabilities, Harlequin

Ingredients:

1 medium-to-large spaghetti squash
2 tbsp butter
1 yellow onion, thinly sliced
½ tsp red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon fresh thyme, or ¼ tsp dried
½ cup sour cream
1 cup cheese of your choice, shredded (cheddar, Havarti, gruyere all make excellent choices).

Directions:
Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees

Cut the spaghetti squash in half and remove the seeds. An ice-cream scoop is a great tool for this job!

Place cut-side-down in a casserole dish with about a centimeter of water, cover with foil and cook for 40 minutes, until soft.

Meanwhile, in a medium skillet over medium heat, melt the butter. Add onions and cook until the onions are slightly caramelized. Add red pepper and thyme.

Use a fork to scrape the insides of the squash, it will come out in long strands. Combine squash, onions, sour cream and ½ cup of the cheese. Transfer to a buttered casserole dish and top with remaining cheese.

Bake, uncovered, for 20 minutes until golden and bubbling.

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Elizabeth Bass – Veggie Pot Pie

For twenty-five years, I’ve been that dreaded thing at holiday time: the vegetarian at the feast. For the first years after I went over to the meatless dark side, I would spend my holidays eating mashed potatoes and receiving pitying or distressed looks from my carnivorous family in Texas. That all changed when I became proactive and made this recipe, which I believe originated in the Moosewood Restaurant New Classics Cookbook. No more pity! The pot pie is so tasty and savory, it usually gets consumed almost as fast as the turkey. It’s a great autumn-winter recipe because it uses so many root vegetables and gives the house a warm, biscuity comfort-food aroma as it bakes. But it’s a flexible recipe, so if you have some green beans or broccoli or anything else you want to toss in before the baking stage, be my guest. Enjoy!- Elizabeth Bass, Carina Press Editor

Ingredients:

1 large onion (yellow or white is best), chopped

1 or 2 sweet potatoes

Several white or yellow potatoes (Yukon Golds, for instance)

2 or 3 parnsips (You could add/substitute rutabagas or turnips)

2 or 3 carrots

A package of mushrooms, sliced

A couple of cloves of garlic, minced

frozen peas (1/2 cup)

frozen corn (1/2 cup)

thyme and marjoram, about ½ tsp apiece

One or two teaspoons of mustard, such as dijon

1 tsp soy sauce

1 tsp salt (or less, if you’re salt conscious)

2 TBSP corn starch

Pepper, to taste

For the topping:

2 cups Flour

1 cup Yogurt

6 TBSP butter (melted)

1 TBSP baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt
½ tsp dried dill (optional, but yummy)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Lightly oil a casserole dish. (I bake the pot pie in the same stainless steel cassoulet pan that I cook the veggies in, which minimizes dishwashing.)

Warm a couple of TBSPs of oil in a soup pot or large sauté pan.  Add chopped onions and and cover, cooking on medium until onions are soft.  Add salt (1 tsp), herbs (thyme and marjoram), mushrooms, mustard and garlic.  Cook until mushrooms are soft and sweaty.

Peel and chop the root veggies. Add the chopped sweet potatoes, white potatoes, parsnips, carrots and one cup of water. (If it looks like it could use a little more water to keep veggies from burning, add it.)  Cook for about ten to fifteen minutes, until the veggies are just tender.  (Remember they’re going to bake for an additional twenty minutes, so be careful not to cook everything down to mush during this step.) Dissolve 2 TBSPs of cornstarch into 1/2 cup of cold water and mix it into the vegetables.  Add peas and corn (about 1/2 cup apiece), 1 tsp soy sauce, and pepper if desired.  Take the veggies off the heat and set aside.

For the biscuit top crust:  In a mixing bowl, mix 2 cups unbleached flour, 1/2 tsp salt, 1 TBSP baking powder, and 1/2 tsp baking soda.  Add mix 6 TBSP melted butter and 1 cup yogurt.  Combine the wet and dry ingredients to make a soft dough.  Mash it down on a lightly floured board until it’s about an inch thick.

Put the veggies in your casserole dish.  Arrange the biscuit topping over the veggies–does not have to be in one smooth sheet.  In fact it’s better to sort of drop in on in a rustic fashion, leaving a few seams for venting.  If you want an herby crust, sprinkle 1/2 tsp dried dill over the biscuit topping (it’s also good blended in).  Bake for about 20 minutes, or until a knife inserted through the biscuit dough comes out clean.  Serve as soon as it comes out of the oven.

Time: Usually about one hour and fifteen minutes.

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Angela James – For your holiday cooking: An awesome dinner roll recipe

A few weeks ago I was looking for a bread recipe to make in my bread machine. I turned, as I so often do, to Twitter, and as a result, ended up with this completely awesome dinner roll recipe, compliments of Bree, one half of the Moira Rogers writing duo. Normally, when I make rolls or bread, my family doesn’t eat more than once piece or roll. So I made this full recipe and then followed the directions in the comments for freezing a portion. I baked only 6 rolls. Umm, big mistake. These rolls were a huge hit with my family. So much so that I’ve made them two batches, and the second batch I made, I doubled, so I could freeze even more.

I didn’t adapt the actual recipe itself from the recipe on AllRecipes, but I did make smaller rolls, and I also didn’t bake them all at once, but froze some for easy baking on weeknights. So I’m including all of those directions.

Ingredients

• 3 cups bread flour
• 3 tablespoons white sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup dry milk powder
• 1 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
• 2 tablespoons butter, softened
• 1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast

Directions

1. Place the bread flour, sugar, salt, milk powder, water, butter, and yeast in the pan of the bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer (this is generally liquid first, and then the dry ingredients, with the yeast coming in last, to keep the liquids and yeast apart until the machine starts mixing). Set on Dough cycle; press Start.
2. Remove risen dough from the machine, deflate, and turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide the dough into eighteen equal pieces (original recipe calls for 12 but I like reasonable sized dinner rolls), and form into rounds. Place the rounds on lightly greased baking sheets. Cover the rolls with a damp cloth, and let rise until doubled in volume, about 40 minutes to an hour.
3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) during final stages of rising.Bake in the preheated oven for 15 minutes, or until the rolls are golden brown.
4. Take 1/4 stick of butter and rub over the top of fresh-out-of-oven rolls to make them shiny (and taste good!)

Some tips I picked up from the reviews:

Don’t scoop the flour out of your flour bag with your measuring cup. Spoon the flour into your measuring cup (keeps you from getting too much flour because scooping compacts into the measuring cup)

You can add dried herbs or well chopped fresh herbs to the rolls to make them a bit different. I like rosemary, oregano and basil.

If you don’t want to back the whole batch of rolls, separate what you want (I do 6-8 rolls at a time) and let only that amount rise for 40 minutes. Take the other 12 or so rolls and place them on a cookie sheet and into freezer, covered w/plastic wrap. Don’t let them rise first! Once they’re frozen, you can throw them in a freezer bag and take out the portions you want when you’re ready. Thaw them in the microwave for about 30 seconds (more if they’re still frozen after 30 seconds. The time depends on your microwave wattage). Then let them rise for 40 minutes to an hour.

It’s that time of year! We will be posting one holiday recipe a day for the month of November from our Carina Press authors and editors!

Heat olive oil over medium heat in a skillet. Put large pot of water over medium/low heat. Thinly slice the onion, toss in pan with a pinch of salt. While the onion cooks down, finely chop the garlic, set aside. Prep your sausage—either into thick slices if it has casing, or into little sausage balls if you bought in bulk. When onion is done to your liking (I like near-caramelized), toss garlic in the pan and cook for 3-5 minutes.

Drop sausage pieces into the pan, leaving be for 2-3 minutes to get nice and brown on one side. While those are cooking, cut up red pepper, zucchini (or squash), and button mushrooms. Stir sausage around in the pan, flipping pieces over to get browned on all sides—if browned bits build up on the bottom of the pan, that’s okay, you’ll be deglazing in a second.

Pour a generous glass of white wine (any non-sweet kind will do, use your favorite). Drink the wine! Pour another generous glass. When the sausage is browned all over and mostly cooked, pour wine in the pan to deglaze, scraping up all the delicious bits as you go.

Let the wine cook down for 3-5 minutes, then toss in the zucchini and stir to coat. If you like things a bit spicy, toss in a pinch of red pepper flakes at this point. Turn up the heat under your pot of water from medium/low to high to bring to a boil. Toss red pepper into the pan, stir to coat. Once they’ve had 3-5 minutes to cook, add the mushrooms, stir, and cover.

Your water should be boiling by now—add plenty of salt, then your pasta. Once pasta is al dente, drain. Using a spoon or carefully tipping the pan with the cover ajar, drizzle some of the liquid from the sausage pan into your pasta pot. Add in a third of the drained pasta, toss to coat. Then drizzle in more liquid from the pan, repeating with the second and third portions of drained pasta. (You may need to add a bit of olive oil to the pasta pot, depending on how much liquid you’ve got in the sausage/veggies pan.)

Plate generous servings of coated pasta, then scoop out generous helpings of sausage and veggies onto each pile of pasta. Sprinkle with grated cheese, serve.