I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Even though we weren't able to go home to Iowa, TC and I had a wonderful Thanksgiving day. I made all of the traditional food fixings for the two of us, and we put up all of the Christmas decorations. It was nice to stay home and relax together. Here are a few pictures from our meal. If you would like the recipes from our meal, go here! For the pumpkin pie recipe, go to Martha Stewart's website. I used a different pie crust recipe but the filling is from Martha Stewart.
I'm a little behind on my Christmas Cookie countdown. I didn't get around to baking last weekend so I'm going to have to post two recipes this week to catch up. Today I made one of my favorite Christmas cookies. Candy cane cookies have been a family tradition since I was little. I would always look forward to making these with my mom. They are so fun to make and taste delicious with the almond extract and the crushed candy canes on top.
Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
1/2 cup shortening
1 cup powdered sugar
1 egg
1 1/2 tsp. almond extract
1 tsp. vanilla
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp red food coloring
1/2 cup crushed candy canes (I put the candy canes in a Ziploc bag and use a hammer to crush)
1/2 cup sugar
Directions:
Mix all ingredients through vanilla. Then mix in the flour and salt. Divide dough in half. Set one dough half aside. Put the other dough half back in your mixer with the red food coloring. Mix until combined/the dough is completely red in color.
Chill the dough for at least a few hours.
When ready, roll out both the red and white dough into thin ropes. Cut into approximately 4-5 inch ropes and place 1 red and 1 white rope side by side. Press together lightly and twist to form a candy cane shape. Don't worry about the dough breaking while you form the candy cane shape. It's easy to repair as you form them.
Mix together the sugar and crushed candy canes in a small bowl and set aside.
Put on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for about 9-12 minutes or until set and very light brown brown. Once out of the oven, sprinkle the cookies with the sugar/peppermint mixture. Let cool on pan before moving to cooling rack, otherwise they will break easily.
