Vanille Kipferln (Almond Crescents)

These were my favorite christmas cookies growing up so I just had to make them this year.

The Goods:

2.5 cups all purpose flour
2/3 cup sugar
1.5 cups ground almonds
1 cup COLD butter
3 egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (or better, if you have the option, 1 pack vanilla sugar, which you can find in the german aisle of the commissary)

powdered sugar for dusting.

The Works:

on a large board (or just your counter, you need some room so I use the counter of my island) sift the flour. Mix the sugar, vanilla extract (or vanilla sugar), almonds into the flour. Add the butter in pieces and the egg yolks and then knead to a smooth dough. Wrap the dough in cling wrap and cool in the fridge for an hour.
Pre-heat your oven to 360 degrees, line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

on your counter (or board, whatever you used), roll the dough out in portions into a long snake (kinda like a pretzel snake) till it is about 1/2 inch thick....cut 1 to 1.5 inch pieces, form into a crescent (halfmoon) and place on cookie sheet. Bake for 12 to 15 min. As soon as the cookies come out of the oven, dust with powdered sugar and let cool.

Store in a plastic container, it will keep the cookies soft and soften them if they got a bit too hard.

Enjoy

Glühwein (hot mulled wine)

Well, the season is coming quickly and this is something that is simply deliscious.Since I can't go to the Christmasmarkets in germany living in the US, I have to make my own. This recipe is one of those that  turns out better depending on what wine you use. You can use red or white wine (traditionally it is made with red wine) and the better wine you use, the better the outcome, cheap wine.. well.. let's just say in this case it pays to pay a bit more and buy some decent  wine.

The Goods:

Wine (I find that Lambrusco or a nice Chardonnay works well), the amount depends on how much you want to make.
sugar (about 1/2 cup per 8 ounce of wine, play with the ratio, depends how sweet you want the endresult to be)
 4 to 6 whole cloves
 1 teaspoon nutmeg
 1 t cinnamon sticks
 2 slices citrus fruit (lemon, lime or orange all work)
all quantities for about 8 oz of wine

The Works:

pour your wine in a pot and set over low heat, add in the cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon and citrus fruit (if you want to make things easier for you pack them in a coffee filter that you tie with some string and add that pouch in, eliminates straining the drink at the end). Let heat up until it almost comes to a boil, but do NOT let it boil. Add the sugar, stiring until it is disolved, let simmer for about 5 to 10 min and serve hot. If you added all the spices and stuff without a pouch, strain the wine first so you have no pieces in it. Enjoy!!
On a side note, while your wine is cooking it will fill your kitchen and maybe even your house with the deliscious smell of christmas

Gebrannte Mandeln (roasted almonds)

Ok so, Chris wanted something done with his nuts (the EATING kind!!) and of course his first thought went to the sweet, sugary roasted nuts you can get at the german christmasmarkets and sometimes over her at fairs. So I researched found a recipe or two, tried out and tweaked until I came up with a combination that I like and that truly tastes deliscious, not to mention it is easy to make!!. You can replace the Almonds in the recipe as you wish with Pecans, Walnuts and so on.

The Goods:

4 cups of Almonds (or whatever nut you wish)
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons ground cinnamon
1/8 cup water
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (or 1 packet vanilla sugar (found at the commissary in the german food section around xmas if you have the option)

The works:

mix the sugar, cinnamon and water in a large, deep pan. Set over high heat and let boil. Once it boils, pour in the nuts and stir with a wooden spoon until the mixture looses the liquid. The sugar will dry back up and make it all a gooey sticky mess. Turn heat down and stir for another 5 minutes (usually comes out to around 20 min of stiring total). On a Large flat cookiesheet covered with parchement paper spread the nutmass out thinly (to avoid later clumbing together) let cool and enjoy. Really, let cool first for a bit, cause just done they are hot enough to burn the skin of your fingers!!!

Candied Sweet Potatoes with Marshmellows

So Thanksgiving is now ever and I am sure we are all stuffed to the guts even now a few days later, I know I am. This recipe came about because we were having thanksgiving with friends and the task of making the various potato side dishes fell to me. For the longest time I did not even eat sweet potatos but that changed ever since I tried my MIL's sweet potato casserole a few years back. There are tons of recipes online for all kinds of variations on sweet potato casserole or candied yams and I guess now I am adding mine to the mix lol. So let's get to it, shall we?

The Goods:

3-4 lbs sweet potato, peeled and cut in small pieces (~1 inch in size)
 1 1/2  to 2 cups of brown sugar ( ore or less if you increase or degrease the amount of potatoes you use)
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
1 to 2 teaspoons (depends how strong you want the influence to be) ground ginger
1 teaspoon of lemon juice
1 cup of water
marshmellows to cover

The Works:

preheat oven to 375 º. in a large roasting pan (foil or nonestick, if you make it to take along I recommend foil) arrange the sweet potatoes, set aside. combine the other ingredients except the marshmellows in a small to medium size saucepan and bring to a boil, stiring constantly until it is a gooey mass and all the sugar is dissolved. Pour the mixture evenly over hte sweet potatos and mix to coat. Cover tightly with foil and bake for 50 min. remove foil and decrease temperature to 350º. bake for another 30 to 40 minutes. Now up to here you can premake the dish up to a day before, simply cover and put into the fridge if you make it ahead, or if you are using it right away (and I mean right away, if you don't need even just for a few more hours, then forgo this next step until about 30 min before you serve the dish) cover  the sweet potatos with minimarshmellow and broil at 500º for about 5 to 10 minutes until marshmellows are melting and slightly brown ontop.

Enjoy