Would Anyone like to Share Their Fave Christmas Goodie Recipes?

We usually make no bake cookies, magic bar cookies, peanut butter cookies topped with kisses or peanut butter cups, pecan or peanut brittle, chocolate dipped ritz & peanut butter sandwiches, oreo cookies &/or pretzels (i like to use ghirardelli chocolate instead of bark). All of these are very simple, old recipes and you can find them easily on the internet. I've also found that the best recipes are usually on the packaging for my favoite ingredient this time of year, be it cocoa, marshmallows, coconut, sweetened condensed milk, etc., I guess the company knows what recipe showcases its product best! Have fun!

Martha Washinton Candy

Ingredients:
•2 pounds sifted confectioners' sugar
•1 can sweetened condensed milk
•2 cups flaked coconut
•1 stick butter or margarine, melted (4 ounces)
•3 cups chopped pecans
•Dipping Chocolate (below), melted

You can sub in Crushed Peppermint Candy for the Coconut and/or Pecans.

You can omit the pecans and coconut altogether and use the "dough" to wrap Marachino Cherries, then dip for DELICIOUS chocolate-covered cherries. If you let them set overnight the liquid and acid in the cherries melts the dough and they are gooey like store-bought cover cherries, only BETTER.

Preparation:
Mix all ingredients together, shape into balls, then chill until hard. Dip chilled balls in dipping chocolate and let cool.
Store in airtight container in refrigerator.

Dipping Chocolate
Use melted chocolate almond bark or purchased dipping chocolate, or the mixture below

•1 cake paraffin wax
•12 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
Melt wax and milk chocolate chips together in double boiler. Dip candy in mixture then cool.

Nannie's Wagon Wheels:

Make Peanut butter/Ritz Cracker sandwiches.
Dip in Melted Almond Bark

** These are BETTER than Reese's Peanut Butter Cups

CHERRY-O CREAM CHEESE PIE

1 (8 oz.) pkg. cream cheese
1 (15 oz.) can Eagle Brand sweetened condensed milk
1/3 c. fresh or bottled lemon juice
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 (1 lb. 6 oz.) can prepared cherry pie filling

Let cream cheese soften to room temperature; whip until fluffy. Gradually add sweetened condensed milk while continuing to beat, well blended. Add lemon juice and vanilla extract; blend well. Pour into prepared pie crust. Chill 2 or 3 hours before garnishing top of pie with cherry pie filling.

This is a hit every year! In fact, I've started having to make two of them to be sure there is enough!
Merry Christmas!
C.

These are incredibly easy, and fun for kids to make.

Pretzel Turtles

1 bag of small knot or square pretzels
1 bag of Rolo candies
1 bag of Pecan halves

Single layer of pretzels on a cookie sheet.
Place one unwrapped Rolo candy on each pretzel.
Put in a 350 degree oven for about 3-4 minutes, until slightly melted.
Place a pecan half on top of slightly melted Rolo (squish it in).
Optional - I put the tray back in the oven for another 2-3 minutes. Helps release the oils in the pecan for an extra nutty flavor.

Let cool. (I will let the cookie sheet cool then place in the refrigerator for a little while until candy hardens. Helps make removal from the pan a lot easier).

Enjoy!

We have also made the cake balls for the past couple of years... even made some that looked like santa hats with a white m&m on top for the ball. You can also use different flavors besides red velvet and the cream cheese icing... any flavor cake with any flavor icing or liquid creamer... even peanut butter. YUMMY! But this is the recipe for our favorite sugar cookie, doesnt spread and easy to make and the kids love to decorate them. Enjoy and have a happy holiday!

6 cups flour
3 tsp. baking powder
2 cups unsalted butter
2 cups sugar (white granulated)
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract or desired flavoring (I like almond myself)
2 tsp all spice seasoning (I like the pumpkin pie spice)
1 tsp. salt

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix well. Mix dry ingredients and add a little at a time to butter mixture. Mix until flour is completely incorporated and the dough comes together.

1.
2.Chill for 1 to 2 hours
3.
4.Roll to desired thickness and cut into desired shapes. Bake on ungreased baking sheet at 350
5.degrees for 8 to 10 minutes or until just beginning to turn brown around the edges. This recipe
6.can make up to 5-dozen 3” cookies.

Rolling Out Dough Without the Mess — Rather than wait for your cookie dough to
chill, take the freshly made dough and place a glob between two sheets of parchment paper.
Roll it out to the desired thickness then place the dough and paper on a cookie sheet and pop
it into the refrigerator. Continue rolling out your dough between sheets of paper until you have
used it all. By the time you are finished, the first batch will be completely chilled and ready to
cut. Reroll leftover dough and repeat the process! An added bonus is that you are not adding
any additional flour to your cookies

Cake balls!! Yumm
Take any box cake mix and make as directed. Cool completely and crumble in a bowl. Take any tub of icing you chose and mix into the cake mix competely. (It will be messy). Roll into 1 inch balls and freeze until firm. ( I usually freeze for 30 minutes or so). Then take either white or chocolate almond bark and melt in the microwave for a few minutes until melted and dip the cake balls into the chocolate and set on wax paper to harden. These are great and you can do flavor combo you want. Some of our favorites are Red Velvet cak mix with Cream cheese icing dipped in white and reg chocolate. Coconut cake mix with coconut icing dipped in regular chocolate. And german chocolate with coconutpecan icing dipped in regular chocolate. I have also done strawberry with strawberry icing in white chocolate. Whatever you like!! They are fun and easy and you can decorate them any way you like with sprikles or other colors of chocolate. Try it out!! Just remember that you jave to decorate then as soon as they come out of the chocolate since they are cold they set fast. Store in refrigerator if they don't all get eaten quicky!

Peppermint Bark-sooo yummy and takes about 10 minutes to prepare, then 45 in the fridge)

1pkg. (1lb.) Nestle white chocolate morsels (Dont substitute for the white bark blocks that are only chocolate flavored. Nestle morsels are delicious and melt easily in microwave instead of having to use a double boiler.)

Peppermint flavoring

1cup peppermint candy canes (approx. 10 candy canes)

Wax paper

Crush the candy canes by placing in a ziplock bag and hammering into small pieces.

Melt the Nestle chips in the microwave being careful not to burn them. Approx. 1 1/2-2 minutes.

Using a wooden spoon, stir the morsels until smooth and add 1/2 tsp. Peppermint extract.extract and half of the crushedvpeppermint.

Working quickly, pour the chocolate onto a wax paper lined baking sheet and spread it out evenly
On the sheet. Sprinkle the remaining peppermint pieces onto the top of the bark. (You can mix all of the candy into the chocolate in the above step, but sprinkling half on the top is "prettier" because you can see the peppermint stripes.) Carefully mash the pieces into the chocolate, so that they don't fall off when you begin to break the bark into chunks.

Place into the fridge fir 45 minutes, then break into pieces.

Voilà!

The Fantasy Fudge recipe on the back of the marshmellow creme jar is the best and fairly easy. Good luck.

My friends love Cake Balls.
Red velvet cake mix
1 can of Cream Cheese Icing
Almond Bark-chocolate
bake cake, let cool
crumble cake in bowl
mix together cake & icing(I use rubber gloves, it's messy)
roll in balls
put the balls on wax paper on a cookie sheet
place in freezer for an hour or so
melt almond bark in microwave-see pkg details
place a ball at a time in melted chocolate
then pull ball out (I use 2 toothpicks & grab them from the sides)
place on wax paper, let stand until hardened.
Enjoy!
Should make 4 dozen

Heath bar cream cheese dip

8oz package of cream cheese
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp of vanilla
10 oz bag of heath bar chips
3 medium granny smith or other tart apple

soften cream cheese, add both sugars, then stir in vanilla and heath bar chips. Slice apples and enjoy!