Peppermint Chocolate Chunk Ice Cream
I’ve never been a big fan of eating candy canes. And those Starlight mints that you spot in a basket for the taking at the door of family restaurants always disappoint. To me, candy canes fill the role of a Christmas decoration. However, the peppermint stripes themselves bring me a wave of nostalgia. When my kids were very young, I decorated our tree with a Candyland theme. I still remember how cute it was that my left-handed daughter hung the candy canes “backwards” (according to my perspective). Today my signature decorating color is aqua. The color red is only welcome once a year — at Christmas — in my home. I love mixing red and white stripes or red and white polka dots with aqua for that vintage feel. This year I searched out red and white candy-cane striped wrapping paper from the Sugar Paper collection at Target to go under my white tree adorned with mostly aqua ornaments. Just a few days before Christmas I asked my kids to pick up a package of those small individually wrapped candy canes with the main intent of them gracing my Papa Noel aqua and white mug on the coffee table. Those candy canes prompted my daughter to keep asking when we were making peppermint ice cream. It started snowing on Christmas Day and the temperature was in the teens. Seemed like a good time to use up the candy canes and make a frosty dessert.
Pull-apart cinnamon bread
In my world, cinnamon rolls are the perfect indulgent treat to enjoy in front of the fireplace with a cup of coffee while opening gifts on Christmas morning. Or any and every morning between Christmas and New Year’s for that matter. Sadly, most years I find that making cinnamon rolls falls to the bottom of the list in my frenzied holiday prepping. When my kids were young, monkey bread (the easier and way-distant cousin of cinnamon rolls) was often the Christmas morning treat. At least until the year I caught my mom’s oven on fire baking monkey bread in her angel food tube pan. Who knew that the buttery sugar and cinnamon mixture would slowly leak to the bottom of her oven. (Sorry mom) This year in the spirit of Christmases past, I made Cinnamon Pull-Apart Bread from Sarah Kieffer. This is brilliant. It gives you the satisfaction of a cinnamon roll with the fun of monkey bread.
Baking all the Christmas Cookies
Family and friends aside, Christmas isn’t Christmas without the decorating, gift buying/wrapping and cookie baking. I’m happy to say that my decorating and most of my shopping were done the first week of December. So while I waited for the supply chain to deliver (or “find” in the case of Fed Ex) my goods, I sorted through many a cookie recipe to distill my 2021 baking selection and make my list of ingredients in preparation for the Brandt family cookie party (aka fiasco or chaos depending on your perspective). A houseful of loud, apron-clad women (and a few men) gathered at one of my sister’s houses last weekend. A medley of Christmas carols, holiday movies and KitchenAid mixers competing in the background made for a crazy-fun day in the kitchen. We made and sampled Salted Chocolate Gingerbread Men, Lemon Sables, Peanut Butter Cup Cookies, Salted Chocolate Chunk Shortbread, Glazed Ginger Cookies and the obligatory Frosted Sugar Cookies.
Christmastime is tamale-time
The abundance of great Mexican food is something our family has missed ever since moving from the Phoenix metro area back to the Pacific Northwest. Heck, my son grew up practically drinking salsa (true story). One year at Christmastime, my husband came home with tamales that his Hispanic colleagues had brought into the office. I was sold. Fast forward, years later we decided to embark on our own tamale-making family adventure. However, there’s no getting around the fact that tamales are time consuming. Lucky for me, I have my husband Ted (aka Theodoro at least when we take a Mexican vacation) to thank for taking the time to document our tamale-making process in writing and photos. Our favorite tamales are a chicken salsa verde version and although they may not necessarily be authentic, they are delicioso.