Monday, December 22, 2008

Sooper Sekrit Recipes!


Moving right along. . .

I'm baking. I cannot even believe how much that little trip to the grocery store cost. (A LOT. No, more than that. More. A little higher.)

So far, I've made a fudge pie for Redneck, to take to his mama's on Christmas Eve. One batch of fudge (with nuts in) and will make one more without nuts.

Fudge by Paul (a former co-worker)
12 oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 cup milk chocolate chips
1 - 14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk
2 Tbsp. milk
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup pecan pieces

Over low heat, melt chips in milk & condensed milk (stir it. a lot.) When completely melted, remove from heat and add vanilla and pecans. Spread in a lightly greased 9x9 pan. Chill for at least 3 hours.

***Instead of greasing the 9x9 pan, I lined it with the non-stick foil. Easy to flip out of the pan, and NO WASHING UP to do. I recommend this method. ***

I'm trying a bread recipe that might be similar to this bread that my grandma used to make when I was little. No one ever got the recipe because there wasn't one. My mom tried and my grandma told her something like: about this much flour, a pinch of this, a few pinches of that. . . while I could've probably figured it out, my mom didn't even bother writing anything down since she's not big on baking (or cooking).

The bread should be almost done rising. Hopefully. If not, then I don't know what I'm going to do with it.

Then, I've got to make the cookies that guarantee my admittance into the house on Christmas. Russian Tea Cakes with Hershey Kisses inside.

Russian Teacakes by Roadchick

1 cup soft butter
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup sifter confectioner's sugar

Mix first three ingredients thoroughly.

Sift together, then stir into the top three ingredients:
2 & 1/4 cups sifted flour
1/4 tsp. salt

Then add:
3/4 cups finely chopped nuts (pecans or walnuts, but pecans are better)

Chill the dough.

Unwrap about a bazillion Hershey Kisses. Don't eat all of them or you'll be sick.

When the dough is cold, mold it around each kiss. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 400 degrees for 10 - 12 minutes until set but not brown. Let cool for a few minutes, but while still warm, roll in confectioner's sugar. Let cool completely, then roll in confectioner's sugar again.

Eat a lot of them, with milk. Yum!

I have a feeling it's going to be crazy around here for the next few days, so Merry Christmas! And remember - he sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake . . .

5 comments:

Marguerite said...

Yummy--I can see I need to get off the computer and into the kitchen. Hope your bread turns out like grandma's. I really enjoy your posts. We have cats so I especially like reading about the adventures of Speedbump.
Merry Christmas!

Anonymous said...

Marguerite~ I've got my fingers crossed on the bread. It smells right, but I haven't cut it yet. Speedbump is hiding - she hates the sound of the mixer.
Merry Christmas!

heather said...

mom made me some white fudge this year. :) i'm not a huge fan of milk or dark chocolate but i do love white chocolate.

i know, i should be ashamed of myself. prejudice is never pretty. i just can't help myself.

and yeah, i hear you on the prices. sugar cookies with cinnamon for the red, vanilla for the white and mint for the green is tradition here. i was out of regular colors (still have tons of neon dyes) and mint. $4.00 for a freaking box of food coloring! holy crap! forget about anything fancier this year. it ain't happenin.

Susan said...

I wish I'd thought of the fudge and foil. (sigggh)

Roadchick said...

Heather~ I've made all this stuff and right now all I can think is: bleah. And I still need to do some more of the tea cake cookies because there aren't enough for everyone that expects them. It would probably help if I didn't have a screaming sinus headache.

Susan~ I came up with the foil because I am lazy. I come up with a lot of things that way.