Dairy-free Eggnog Smoothie

This is one of my favorite holiday treats!

Blend together until smooth:

1/2 cup soy nog
1/2 cup rice milk
1 frozen banana
dash nutmeg

Enjoy!

Gingerbread Cookies

My son wanted to make gingerbread people for Christmas.  I really liked the gingerbread cookies on our Disney cruise, so I tried this recipe.

After chilling the dough, I rolled it thick (about as thick as my index finger), cut out the cookies and baked them for 8 minutes.  You don't want to overcook gingerbread dough, especially if you like soft cookies.  One recipe made six large cookies.

The cookies smell amazing!!!

Christmas Foodcrafting

I have a tradition of making gifts for my colleagues at Christmas.  Some things I've made in the past:

• candy cane bath salts
• stove top potpourri
• mulling spices
• gingerbread cookie mix with a cookie cutter
• peppermint bark cake balls
• s'mores caramel corn
• spiced nuts

This year I made cake pops with red velvet cake and cream cheese frosting.  I dipped half of the pops in white chocolate and the other half in dark chocolate.  I love the taste of Ghirardelli candy melts but they are a little runny.  I mixed half Ghirardelli candy melts with half Wilton candy melts -- it was the perfect combination of flavor and consistency.

I sprinkled the white cake pops with clear sugar sprinkles, and the dark cake pops with white nonpareils.  I packaged them using buckets from the One Spot at Target.  I also individually wrapped some of the pops with a ribbon and a gift tag.  I love how they turned out!

  

A few weeks ago my son told me that he wanted to give something to the kids in his preschool class.  I was inspired by something I saw pre-made at Target.  We put jumbo marshmallows on a long sucker stick and dipped them in chocolate candy melts.  Then we dipped them in Andes peppermint crunch baking chips.  My five-year old was able to do most of the work with a little guidance from me.  Easy and fun!  The only thing I would do differently next time is to use a thicker stick like a cookie stick.

Spooktacular Treats

I love holidays, and they are even more fun now that I have a kiddo.  We were looking for something to do one weekend in October, so we made a haunted gingerbread house.  I used melted marshmallows to glue the house together -- they weren't quite strong enough to hold for longer than an hour.  Next time I might try melting gummy bears and marshmallows together.

I needed to take treats to a Halloween potluck lunch at work.  My son told me I should make eyeball cupcakes (he is very creative!).  I used Lindt white chocolate truffles and decorated them with food markers.  They were a big hit!