Merry Berry Cheesecake Bars

 

I tried a new recipe at Thanksgiving ... with the express purpose of using it here in my Christmas kitchen.  This recipe was found in a 1998 Christmas magazine, and I had it tucked in a box of items I find useful for freebies to send out with Etsy orders.  In fact, I had been just about to put this in with an order when I took another look at it and decided to keep it.

It looked easy and I had absolutely everything on hand that it called for.  It would make a nice little extra Thanksgiving dessert -- and, if we liked it, it would also be something new for our Christmas cookie trays.  

Mr. T made the bars, people enjoyed them, and he has already decided to bake another batch for his Christmas cookie stash.    Maybe you would enjoy these, too!

Christmas in July iced tea!

 

Recently on Instagram I noticed a giveaway for Christmas in July cranberry hibiscus iced tea.  I was intrigued!  Although I didn't meet the criteria for entering the giveaway, I absolutely had to visit the Republic of Tea website and check it out.

It's a limited edition -- only available while supplies last! -- and this is the description: "This juicy caffeine-free herbal blend has a base of sweet-tart ruby hibiscus and cranberries and finishes with a touch of yuletide spice."

These are the ingredients: Hibiscus, cinnamon, ginger, carob bits, apple bits, sweet blackberry leaves, cardamom seeds, natural flavors, chicory root, pepper, cloves, cranberry bits and star anise.  

What an amazing blend of flavors!  It sounds so delicious for a hot July day, don't you agree?

Homemade cranberry sauce with cherries, ginger and lime

 

I recently came upon this recipe in the November 2008 issue of Cook & Tell, a delightful recipe newsletter I subscribed to for years.  It's no longer being published, alas.  But I have all of my old issues and peruse them when I can.  I especially love the December issues, but a few days before Thanksgiving I browsed through a couple of November ones -- and spotted this recipe.  There was no need to make cranberry sauce for the Thanksgiving feast, as my daughter was making the whole berry kind, and the kids prefer jellied.  So I filed this away in my memory bank in case turkey or chicken make it onto the Christmas menu with our crowd.  Now I'm sharing it here so I can't forget where I put it!

CRANBERRY-CHERRY SAUCE WITH LIME AND GINGER

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup dried tart cherries
1/4 cup fresh lime juice
2 Tblsp. crystallized ginger, chopped
Pinch of salt
3/4 cup water
1 12-ounce bag fresh cranberries

Place the sugar, cherries, lime juice, ginger, salt, and water in a saucepan.  Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring till the sugar dissolves.  Add the cranberries and simmer till the berries burst and the sauce thickens, about 8 minutes.  Chill at least 2 hours before serving.  Makes about 2 1/2 cups.  

Doesn't that sound delectable?  And easy?

Cranberry Breakfast Cake

 

Recently I was looking for an easy coffeecake to bake for a ladies' brunch at church.  (Long story -- the brunch was scheduled for May, but first sickness and then other events -- our merger service for example -- kept pushing the date back until here we are near the end of July and just now having the brunch.  It's no one's fault, but there it is.)  

The weather has been exceedingly hot and humid and I couldn't have felt less like baking.  I went searching for something a little different and found this Cranberry Breakfast Cake which looked quite simple and seemed as if it would be delicious any time of year.

Photo by The View from Great Island

 
I've learned that I can't go wrong with a recipe from Sue Moran at The View from Great Island.  Foods made from her recipes are always delicious and enticing!  I had almost everything I needed on hand to bake this cake.  The only thing I didn't have was the sparkling sugar for the top.

I couldn't bring myself to bake during the day so decided I would start early the next morning.  I sifted the dry ingredients together the night before and left them in a quart-size ziptop bag, to save time in the morning.  If I had thought of it, I would also have placed a stick of butter in a covered bowl to soften.

Then in the morning it was a quick matter to get everything together.  Sue warns that the batter (really more like dough) will be quite thick, and it truly was.  Adding the frozen cranberries really stiffened it up.  It was quite a challenge to spread the batter evenly in the pan, but with the help of a small sandwich spreader I was able to do so.  I did sprinkle a handful of the berries on top as Sue suggested.  Since I had no sparkling sugar (a situation I will try to remedy), I sprinkled on a bit of regular white sugar instead.

This came out so delicious and was so easy!  It would be a great choice for Christmas breakfast or any festive breakfast or brunch time during the holiday season.  And it's good in July too, if you can bring yourself to turn the oven on!

March muffin recipe: Cranberry Streusel Muffins

I'm sneaking in just under the wire of March 31 with a muffin recipe.  (I've been trying a muffin recipe every month with an eye to next Christmas's kitchen gifts.)   It's been a super busy month which thankfully started out with a quiet week as volunteer caretakers at a camp closed for the winter.  Much of the staff had to be out of state and my hubby and I were asked to stay on site and look after things, make sure pipes didn't freeze, and take care of any necessary snow removal.  It was a most relaxing week.  Cross-stitch on the sunny porch below was part of my relaxation.  The porch was unheated, but on sunny afternoons it was truly comfortable.

The day we returned, we got the news that my mother-in-law was being hospitalized.  She was there about ten days and is now home, but Mr. T and his siblings have been on the go trying to meet her needs and work toward long-term care.  The paperwork, the emails, the phone calls, and much, much more have kept us beyond busy.  Not to mention, our church is finalizing a merger with another church and my hubby is up to his ears in details and legalities regarding that.

So I count it a blessing that I could duck into my actual kitchen yesterday and try out a muffin recipe, then duck into my Christmas kitchen here and share it with you.

The recipe is for Cranberry Streusel Muffins and it's from my blog friend Denise Cunningham at RefreshHer.  I've also been blessed to meet Denise in person, and you can read about that here.  While you are at Denise's blog, you might like to check out her other recipes.  She's a fantastic cook and has an entire indexed page for her recipe links.

Photo by Denise at RefreshHer

 There is a bit of work to putting these together -- you need to chop cranberries and make a streusel topping -- but they are really delicious and so worth the extra minutes.  The streusel topping just makes the muffins!  It is so amazing how very small quantities of a few simple ingredients can produce such a wonderful addition to a baked good.  

I was very pleased with this muffin recipe!  It may be the best of the three I've tried so far.  Try them and see what you think!

For the cookie party: White Chocolate Cranberry Oatmeal Bars

I'm always on the lookout for potential Christmas cookie recipes.   We give away many dozens of cookies each Christmas, and I keep tins of them in the freezer for gifting, taking to holiday parties or events, or serving to family or guests.  So when I see a recipe that looks good, I'm apt to either give it a try right away or file for later use.  In fact, I have an entire Pinterest board titled  Christmas Cookie Exchange,  where I've pinned many want-to try recipes.  You might enjoy visiting this fun board for your own cookie ideas.

Recently, I found and pinned this recipe for  White Chocolate Cranberry Oatmeal Bars from Karly at Buns in My Oven.  White chocolate and cranberries are both such festive flavors, don't you think?  And I really like the idea of baking them into moist, chewy bars rather than a crunchy, crispy cookie.  Karly promises that these bars are "soft, chewy, and completely addictive". 

Photo by Karly at Buns in My Oven

Hope you'll try this recipe on the next cool rainy day!

Homemade jellied cranberry sauce

Photo from Chowhound.com

Have you ever made your own cranberry sauce?  I've made whole berry sauce and all sorts of cranberry relishes, but up until this past Thanksgiving I had never tried making the jellied type of cranberry sauce.

It all started when my daughter mentioned she was having trouble finding the organic canned cranberry sauce she usually buys.  Everything else, even good brands, contains high fructose corn syrup, and her kids like jellied cranberry sauce so much, she wants it to be somewhat healthier.   I said I would try making some to bring to Thanksgiving dinner at their home.  There was a recipe on the cranberry bag.

Well, that recipe didn't work out so well.  I prepared and refrigerated it on Wednesday night, but by Thursday morning it had still not set.  I would have caved and simply brought a can of regular jellied sauce from my pantry, but I only had whole berry.  Not wishing to disappoint anyone, my sweet husband pleaded with me to let him try making some, as we had plenty of cranberries.  So I looked online and found this recipe: Jellied Cranberry Sauce via Chowhound.  The recipe said it would need to chill for at least 2 hours, but we had started our Thanksgiving morning early and had plenty of time for that to happen.

 I was surprised how quickly the recipe came together.  Before I knew it, the sauce was cooked and strained and ready to add the unflavored gelatin.  (We opted not to use the cinnamon stick and orange zest, although I'm sure those would have been yummy additions, because we wanted it to taste more like the canned jellied sauce.)

It came out delicious and the kids raved over it: "Good job, Grampa!"

My daughter asked for the recipe and said she would never have to buy the canned sauce again.

I'm sharing this recipe now so you will have plenty of time to buy cranberries and unflavored gelatin, which not everyone has in their pantry, if you would like to try this.  I do definitely recommend purchasing Ocean Spray cranberries.

Hope your family enjoys this delicious homemade sauce if you try it!

Mulled Cranberry=Orange Juice

Here's a warm, delicious holiday beverage!  I just made this again for our simple cookie swap on Tuesday evening.  As you might guess by the above image (which I found on the ever-helpful Pixabay), I failed to take a picture of it.  When I mentioned this drink in my post about the cookie swap, a reader asked for the recipe.  I had to go back and look: it was 2007 when I posted this.  So in my view it is high time for a repost.  Here it is, with an update or two:

MULLED CRANBERRY ORANGE JUICE

1 orange
12 whole cloves
a cinnamon stick
1 cup water
2 quarts cranberry juice cocktail -- I used the kind without sugar that is 100% juice.  It includes other juices, obviously, but that's preferable to sugar.
1/2 cup golden raisins (optional) -- I have never used these
1/2 tsp. ground cardamom -- again, can be optional if you don't have it.  I didn't. 
3 Tblsp. fresh lemon juice (bottled will work)
3 Tblsp. brown sugar

Use a vegetable peeler to peel off thin strips of orange peel from the orange. Set the orange aside. Put the peel in a small saucepan with the cloves, cinnamon stick and water. Bring this mixture to a simmer; cover and simmer over low heat for 20 minutes.

In a larger saucepan combine all of the remaining ingredients. Cut the orange in half and squeeze the juice into this larger saucepan. Using a strainer, strain the liquid from the spice/peel mixture into the larger saucepan as well. Add the lemon juice and brown sugar.  Heat the mixture in the large saucepan over low heat until it is hot. May be kept simmering over very low heat and ladled out as needed.

(For the cookie swap, I tried making this in a slow cooker and it worked beautifully.  About 2 hours before serving I put the cranberry juice into a 3-quart slow cooker and set it on high.  Then I proceeded to peel the orange.  I simmered the peel with the water, cloves and cinnamon stick for the 20 minutes as specified.  Then I strained this mixture into the slow cooker and added the juice of the orange, the brown sugar and the lemon juice and let it all cook on high until ready to serve.  Then I turned off the slow cooker and it stayed plenty hot enough.)

If you want to be fancy, pour the mixture into mugs and top each one with an orange slice with a whole clove or two stuck in the rind.

Save the cranberry juice bottle to store any leftover beverage.  It reheats well by the mug in the microwave.

This recipe came from Cook & Tell, my favorite cooking newsletter. I discovered this beverage recipe a dozen years ago and it became an instant favorite of mine to serve to guests at holiday time.  I still love it.