happy belated holidays

I’ll make this quick – it’s 2am and I’m exhausted but motivated! I didn’t get around to making a holiday post, since everything was hectic what with getting to see family and friends again and my luggage being lost. But I had a fantastic holiday and I hope everyone else did too! Some snippets:

Last year post-Christmas, my roommate and I scouted out some awesome deals at Wal-Mart and picked up an awesome white tree for a pretty good price. I was so sad I wasn’t there to decorate it with my roommates but they left the tree up for me to see after Spain – sooooo cute!

I baked cookies with my little sister. She’ll make you think she did all the work, but I decorated them too! So there. They’re so pretty it makes you want to eat all of them! 

My friends and I have basically taken over the Dunkin Donuts here (the only place to hang out past 7pm) and I couldn’t be happier. I’ve been eating my weight in cookies and sitting in front of the woodstove catching up on blogs…I love being home for the holidays!

mmmm sprinkle cookies

 

I went over to my roommate Heather's house right before we went home for Christmas break, and we baked a double batch of Italian Sprinkle Cookies with Heather's mom.  It was so fun!  The recipe was called "Aunt Lena's Italian Sprinkle Cookies", but I remember my grandma making these for many many years when I was little, calling them her Ukrainian cookies. :-P Heather's mom got the recipe online, and it made me really happy to know these cookies I used to love were so easy to make!

These colorful cookies make a great gift no matter what season it is.  We bagged them up and gave them out in groups of 6's, 8's and 12's to friends, family, co-workers, and bosses.  The cookies were delicious!  The key to this recipe is to use pure almond and lemon extract - the quality really makes a difference when the cookie relies on the extracts for flavor.  You also want to make sure to use fresh sprinkles!  In the past, I've accidentally used stale sprinkles on birthday cakes and it really brings down the taste.  Oops!

The original instructions said to mix melted shortening into the flour mix, but that ended up creating tons of lumps (not that that affected the taste at all!).  We ended up going through the dough piece by piece, trying to smooth out all of the lumps and bumps.  We guessed that adding the flour to the shortening instead would've avoided this, and Heather made the recipe again a little late, she told me it did!  The glaze was also much too thin at first, running right off the cookies and not really holding sprinkles.  So, I'm posting the edited version below.  Enjoy!

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Aunt Lena's Italian Sprinkle Cookies

makes about 7 dozen

Ingredients:
6 eggs
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups confectioners’ sugar
2 tablespoons PLUS 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 cup shortening, melted
1 tablespoon almond extract
1 1/2 teaspoons lemon extract

Glaze

1/2 cup warms milk
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/3 lb confectioners’ sugar
Round colored sprinkles

Using a heavy-duty electric mixer on high speed, beat eggs until light and foamy, about 5 minutes. Set aside. In another mixing bowl, stir together flour, sugar and baking powder.  Pour the melted shortening and extracts into a large mixing bowl.  Gradually add the flour mixture to the melted shortening and extracts until a bead-like texture is formed. Gradually add beaten eggs (dough will be stiff). Roll dough into 1-in, balls. Place on ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 minutes. The tops of the cookies will not brown, but the bottoms should brown slightly.

For glaze, combine milk and extracts in a large bowl. Add sugar; whisk until all lumps are dissolved and the glaze is smooth. As soon as cookies are removed from the oven, quickly immerse two or three at a time into the glaze. Remove with a slotted spoon or fingers. Place cookies on wire racks to drain. Quickly top with sprinkles. Let dry 24 hours before storing in airtight containers.

International Snack Exchange!

So I joined the snacksters community on LiveJournal a few months ago, and just missed the sign ups for a round of international snack exchanges.  I waited eagerly for the next one, and then the community died.  BUT, I just got finished doing a snack exchange with Anouk from the Netherlands, so all was not lost! :D

We sent our packages out last week, and of COURSE mine came while I was in Seattle and after Chris had left the apartment...but my other roommate signed for me, and I had something to look forward to when I came back!  (I hadn't been looking forward to going back to the "real world", haha.)  So anyway!  It was great to be welcomed back to the apartment with this after a long drive on the Mass Pike through several rainstorms at midnight, and an even longer (delayed) flight before that from Northern Kentucky (oy).

So of course, pictures are in order!

This was the mess I made unpacking the whole box...everything was wrapped so well!  Nothing was broken at all, I know there were some worries with the Kinder Surprise eggs (YUM) but they were fine! :)

Chris pondering the licorice...and I'm sure he'll want me to note that he does not normally wear that shirt, haha.  It was a hot night.  Anyway, the licorice was surprisingly tasty!  I do not normally like black licorice, but this had a very good taste - it tasted strongly of coffee to me, which of course I love (just got back from Seattle!), and the half black licorice-half fruity licorice pieces tasted like they were made from real fruit!  I definitely enjoyed them.  Chris's favorites are the pyramid shaped pieces, which have the texture of tapioca (not a good texture to me, but he loves it!).

The whole package!  I don't know if everything's visible (there was so much!  Even Chris said, "All this was only $25?"), but I'll try to go through it all...there are several baking-type things (apple tart and pancake mix can be seen in the picture) that I can't wait to try!  Anouk thoughtfully translated the instructions for me...I didn't even think of asking.  Thanks! 

There are also these delicious ham and cheese waffle snack things - they are like Cheetos, but ham and cheese flavored.  Yum!  Those will be gone soon I think.  I haven't tried the bacon-flavored peanuts (I think that's what they look like, at least), but they look really good too.

Then there are the chocolate sprinkles for toast, which I really wanted to try - the idea seems so funny to me!  What a good idea, to have chocolate on your toast :).  I also asked for some Kinder surprise eggs, 2 of which Chris and I ate as soon as I opened the box, and I'm saving the other for a friend.  I haven't tried the marzipan and chocolate dipped cookies yet, but I will be as soon as I take my lunch.  They look DELICIOUS!  I'm saving one for my mom, too, since she adores marzipan and it's hard to find the good stuff here.

I also got a lot of cookies!  I can't wait to try them all - I found these really interesting because a lot of them look familiar to me, from my childhood, but I cannot remember where, when, or even if I really had them!  I really wanted to try the Stroopwaffles, because I remember having them vaguely at a friend's house when I was little, maybe.  Or I dreamed about them :-P.  But if it's what I remember, they were amazing!  I'm just wondering how I've had them before...

I already tried one of the XL cookies - yum!  I get the feeling that this post is getting a little long though.  So, I'll wrap up with a big THANK YOU!!! to Anouk (and Tommy!), and let me know if you want to do this again! I'm game :).  I can't wait to try everything else!

Cheers!