Megan McArdle asks us to tell her what we are baking for Christmas this year. Her thoughts have turned towards pie baking:
[Twitter]
asymmetricinfo Megan McArdle
Stupidest appliance ever? I want to buy one just to find out what I'm missing: http://bit.ly/hG1pGY
The appliance makes mini-pies, and McArdle also writes a post saying how stupid it is. So she acknowledges the pie cooker is stupid but she wants one anyway because it might not be as stupid as it seems, for some magical reason. Which explains her political philosophy.
But because I love to bake and therefore go hog-wild at the holidays, let's give McArdle a list of my holiday cooking plans:
Christmas Baking:
Cookies: Chocolate Chip, M&M, Oatmeal Raisin, Molasses, Shortbread, Peanut Butter, and Lemon-Lime
Quick Breads: Banana Nut, Cranberry Orange, Stollen (usually bought to save time), Cornbread (for stuffing), Scones
Pies: Apple, Pumpkin, Mince, Cherry
Savories: Sausage Puff Pastry Triangles, Mini-Quiche Lorraine, Pasties
Cakes: Pumpkin Spice Bars, either cupcakes or a chocolate cake
I have a tea party on Christmas Eve with the children and maybe a few relatives, so we can sit down, relax, and enjoy some of the fruits of my labor before the Santa-ing later that night and the big meals the next day.
It's insane to do so much baking but it's also fun, especially when the work is done and it's time to eat.
3 comments:
I can't compete. I'm cooking a Channukah party right now and I'm only making:
Latkes
Smoked Fish
Two Salads
Two Soups
Apple Sauce
Spicy Cranberry Chutney
Rugelach
Flourless Chocolate Torte
Square Puff Pastry Open Apple Tarts
Maybe Gougeres if I get around to it since I don't have to stand there frying them.
I haven't started on the theory of Christmas Eve which we always celebrate because it was my Grandfather's birthday but I make a brandy/pecan/yellow raisin cake that's pretty serious and I serve it with hot fudge sauce in case people still have an unclogged artery.
aimai
That's some serious baking as well!
I try to bake early and freeze for later, so on Christmas Eve I just have to make the pastry items.
It's so much fun to abandon restraint for a couple of days.
I'm not a good pie baker. We're having a quickie sour cherry crumble for dessert tonight and we knocked out a trial chocolate pecan torte that didn't work too well on Thanksgiving (I got it off of the Green and Black Chocolate internet site and it was too dense and cakey for my taste. I was aiming for something more like an american chocolate pecan pie, KWIM?) This time we blind baked our extra sample cookie crust flavored with rosemary and added a whole lot of cream to the leftover chocolate batter and underbaked it figuring how bad can it be? We'll serve it tomorrow, too, just for the hell of it.
We are up to 26 adults and 20 kids so I figure it will all get eaten one way or another.
I hate to freeze things even though lots of cakes and pies are perfectly good that way.
aimai
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