Christmas Menu 2022

Now that my mom has moved to New York, I hosted my family for Christmas for the first time this year. We cut down two Christmas trees to make our home extra-festive! We also all had matching pajamas, of course.

We celebrated Christmas Eve with a (modified) traditional Ukrainian vegetarian feast from my husband’s family’s tradition and Christmas morning crêpes from my family’s tradition. It was great.

We had a crowd. I made two gluten-free quick breads in advance, Orange Glazed Cranberry-Pecan Bread and Banana Bread, to serve for breakfast. We also had bagels, panettone, Danish Almond Kringle, yogurt, oats, and cereal. Fresh fruit too.

My nieces and I made applesauce with over fifteen pounds of apples! We incorporated our fabulous, naturally-sweet sauce into more than one meal. 🙂 I also made Wild Rice & Mushroom Soup, Classic Split Pea Soup, and Lentil-Kielbasa Soup to serve throughout the week for lunch.

I served my mom’s traditional pork roast Christmas dinner after Christmas- I may modify the order of these meals in the future. My sister-in-law also brought wonderful Austrian pastry crisps and cookies from Demel that we nibbled on every day.

I had also planned to make our favorite chili and butter chicken, but my family treated us out to dinner in New York City one evening and for take-out on another evening- Perfect. 🙂

Selfishly, I am posting my menus to help with planning in the future. Hopefully others may benefit in some way! Happy New Year!

Christmas Eve Eve:

• Apple Cider Margaritas or Sparkling Apple Cider
• Guacamole with Tortilla Chips
• Shortcut Enchiladas Verdes
• Basmati Brown Rice, Refried Beans & Street Corn
• assorted Christmas Cookies

Christmas Eve:

• Challah Cubes drizzled with Honey
• Vodka Shots or Sparkling Apple Cider
• Borscht with Vushka (mushroom-onion dumplings) garnished with Dill & Sour Cream, as desired
• Potato-Onion Pierogies with Applesauce & Sour Cream
• Panko-Crusted Mustard Salmon with Basmati Brown Rice, Roasted Broccoli & Cauliflower
• Apple Strudel or Brown Sugar Baked Apple (gluten-free) with Vanilla Ice Cream

Christmas Day Breakfast:

• Crêpes (classic & gluten-free) filled with sugar or Applesauce
• fresh Pineapple, Cantaloupe & Bananas
• Orange & Guava (long story) Juice
• Hot Chocolate

Christmas Day Dinner:

• Brie with Sourdough Baguette Slices
• Lasagna (with gluten-free pasta)
• Butternut Squash Macaroni and Cheese (with gluten-free pasta)
• Green salad with Mustard Vinaigrette
• Apple Strudel with Vanilla Ice Cream & assorted Christmas Cookies

Post-Christmas Dinner:

• Beecher’s Flagship Handmade Cheese and Brie with Raisin-Rosemary Crisps and Multi-Grain Crunchmaster crackers
• green grapes, cashews, & Trader Joe’s Step up to the Bar Snack Mix
• Glazed Spicy Pork Roast
• Roasted Brussels Sprouts, Rainbow Carrots, Butternut Squash, & Gold Potatoes
• assorted Christmas Cookies

Christmas Cookies 2022

I hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday! These are the cookies that we shared with our family and friends this Christmas season.

My list of favorite cookies continues to grow- at some point I will have to edit myself. 😉 I tried a new glazed gingerbread cookie using snowflake cookie stamps. I also made spritz cookies with almonds and almond extract using my grandmother’s cookie press. Festive and fun.

Best wishes for a Happy and Healthy 2023!

Cookies Clockwise from Top:

• Pecan Shortbread Cookies (4x recipe- 2 batches of 2x recipe)
• Chocolate-Espresso Snowcaps (2x recipe)
• Lemon Butter Cookies (2x recipe)
• Speculoos with Spiced Sugar Topping (2x recipe)
• Haystacks  (1x recipe)
• Raspberry Meringue Kisses (2x recipe)
• Spritz Butter Cookies (2x recipe)
• German Lebkuchen (2x recipe)

Cookies in Center:

• Hazelnut Linzer Cookies (2x recipe)
• Soft Stamped Gingerbread Cookies with Glaze (1x recipe)

Thanksgiving Menu 2022

Happy Belated Thanksgiving!

For the first time, we didn’t have overnight guests for the holiday. My mom moved to New York! 🙂 Our family joined us for the day and we ate our feast in the early afternoon. Because of the time of day, we had to forgo a festive cocktail- I am planning to incorporate it into our Christmas feast!

I made many tried and true dishes. My son noted that we may almost have our perfect menu. ❤ I added a new Brussels sprouts dish (delicious) and an additional pie, Nutmeg-Maple Custard, which will most certainly be included in the menu next year.

I document our menu to help me in the future. I included the preparation timeline as well because it was relatively stress-free this year. I hope that some of this is helpful for others! 🙂

Menu:

Appetizers:

• green grapes
• sourdough baguette and brie
• mixed nuts
• Turkey Bread, photo below (from the ciabatta used to roast the turkey upside-down)

Dinner:

• Herb-Roasted Turkey with Wild Mushroom Gravy (upside-down)
• Cornbread Dressing with Bacon and Sage
• Cranberry Relish with Apple Cider
• Make-Ahead Mashed Potatoes
• Sweet Potato Spoon Bread (gluten-free version)
• Roasted Brussels Sprouts With Maple-Gochujang Brown Butter
• Roasted Cauliflower & Chickpeas with Mustard Vinaigrette x2
• Roasted Rainbow Carrots (4 pounds)
• Nutmeg-Maple Custard Pie
• Pumpkin Chiffon Pie with optional whipped cream
• Brown-Butter & Vanilla Bean Apple Pie with optional whipped cream

Leftover Dishes:

• Turkey Stock
• Sweet Potato Biscuits
• Turkey Corn Chowder
• Roasted Rutabaga & Pears with Browned Butter, Honey & Rosemary

Schedule:

Four to Five Days Before:

• list and grocery shopping

Three Days Before:

• make Cranberry Relish
• decorate and clean house

Two Days Before:

• make, chill, roll, chill, and par-bake Pie Crusts
• bake Skillet Cornbread for Stuffing
• bake sweet potatoes for Spoon Bread & Biscuits

One Day Before:

• plan serving pieces, china, and linens
• prep Vegetables
• bake Pies
• assemble Stuffing
• make Mashed Potatoes
• purchase Sourdough Baguette

Thanksgiving Day:

• set table
• bake Stuffing
• purée and bake Spoon Bread
• Roast Turkey (we roasted a 14.5 lb turkey for a little over 2 hours- until thigh=165 degrees)
• roast Vegetables (and make sauces)
• re-heat Mashed Potatoes
• make Gravy (we made half the recipe because we had a smaller turkey- mistake!)

Christmas Cookies 2021

I hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday! These are the cookies that we shared with our family and friends this Christmas season.

Many old favorites reappeared – I needed the comfort of the tried and true. 🙂 I will post the recipes for the new additions soon. I tried new Speculoos and spritz butter cookies. We loved both!

Best wishes for a Happy and Healthy 2022!

Cookies Clockwise from Top:

• Pecan Shortbread Cookies (4x recipe- 2 batches of 2x recipe)
• Haystacks (2x recipe)
• Lemon Butter Cookies (2x recipe)
• Chocolate-Espresso Snowcaps (2x recipe)
• Speculoos with Spiced Sugar Topping (1x recipe)
• Raspberry Meringue Kisses (2x recipe)
• Italian Butter (Spritz) Cookies (2x recipe)
• German Lebkuchen (2x recipe)

Cookies in Center:

• Hazelnut Linzer Cookies (2x recipe)

Thanksgiving Menu 2021

Happy belated Thanksgiving and Happy Holiday Season! 🙂 We were so happy to be able to celebrate with extended family this year!

I love to post my Thanksgiving Menu to help me plan in the future. Hopefully some of my menu choices are helpful to others too. I will link the new menu items to posts as soon as I am able.

Highlights of our celebration this year included my son’s Chamber Orchestra Thanksgiving concert and the beautiful place cards that my daughter made for our table. My kids also helped cook! My son made the mashed potatoes (his favorite) and gravy. My daughter made the vegetables and dip, photo above, to bring to a Friendsgiving celebration. My 19-month old niece brought her fabulous artwork to contribute to the decor, photo below. 🙂

Our meal included many old favorites. I revisited an apple-pear pie which was absolutely wonderful. I also tried new stuffing, Brussels sprouts, and pumpkin pie recipes. Lovely!

Thanksgiving Eve Eve:

• Speedy Baked Ziti
• Green Salad with Mustard Vinaigrette
• French Apple Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream

Thanksgiving Eve:

• Vanilla Pear Sour
• Flagship-Beecher’s handmade cheese with Raisin-Rosemary Crisps
• Shrimp in Yellow Curry
• French Apple Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream

Thanksgiving Day:

Breakfast:

• fresh mango, pineapple, & cantaloupe
• bagels with cream cheese, butter, and/or jam
• Crumb Cake
• Olive Oil Pumpkin Bread with Walnuts & Raisins (Bundt loaf)
• Banana Bread with Crunchy Sugar Topping (Pullman loaf)

Lunch:

• Classic Split Pea Soup
• Wild Rice & Mushroom Soup
• red grapes with sliced Honey Crisp apples and Bartlett pears
• sourdough bread and baguette slices with brie

Festive Cocktail: (served with our “Turkey Bread” appetizer)

• Apple Cider Margarita

Dinner:

• Herb-Roasted Turkey with Wild Mushroom Gravy (upside-down)
• Buttermilk Cornbread Dressing with Italian Sausage
• Cranberry Relish with Apple Cider
• Make-Ahead Mashed Potatoes
• Sweet Potato Spoon Bread
• Brussels & Broccoli Agrodolce with Cranberries & Chilies
• Roasted Cauliflower & Chickpeas with Mustard Vinaigrette
• Ruffled Pumpkin Milk Pie with optional whipped cream
• Vanilla Bean Apple-Pear Pie with Walnut Crust with optional whipped cream or vanilla ice cream

Leftover Dishes:

• Turkey Corn Chowder with Bacon
• Turkey Stock
• Sweet Potato Biscuits

Christmas Cookies 2020

Happy Holidays!

Although this holiday season has been very different, I was still happy to be able to share our Christmas cookies with family and friends. The assortment included our usual favorites, listed below. I added a Christmas version of our special linzer cookies, a vanilla bean version of my husband’s favorite- spritz cookies, and a new speculoos cookie.

Wishing you all a happy and healthy 2021!

Cookies Clockwise from Top:

• Chocolate-Espresso Snowcaps (2x recipe)
• German Lebkuchen (2x recipe)
• Lemon Butter Cookies (2x recipe)
• Haystacks (2x recipe)
• Belgian Spice Cookies (Speculoos) (2x recipe)
• Raspberry Meringue Kisses (2x recipe)
• Vanilla Bean Spritz Cookies (2x recipe)
• Hazelnut Linzer Cookies (2x recipe)
• Pecan Shortbread Cookies (4x recipe- 2 batches of 2x recipe)

Thanksgiving Menu 2020

Happy belated Thanksgiving and Happy Holiday Season to everyone! We definitely missed our extended family at Thanksgiving this year but our quiet feast was still lovely.

I love to post my Thanksgiving Menu to help me plan in the future. Hopefully some of my menu choices are helpful to others too. I will link the new menu items to posts as soon as I am able.

I decreased the proportions for our small scale feast but we still made quite a variety of dishes in order to accommodate everyone’s favorites. My kids actively participated in the cooking process throughout the day which was the absolute highlight for me. 🙂

We tried a new gravy this year- this change would have been met with great objection from our extended family. 😉 It incorporated roasted poblano chilies, a favorite flavor in our house. We also enjoyed a new festive cocktail which was so fabulous I plan to incorporate it into the menu next year.

Breakfast:

• Fresh honeydew, pineapple, grapes & cantaloupe
• Crumb Cake
• Olive Oil Pumpkin Bread with Walnuts & Raisins (Bundt loaf)

Lunch:

• Classic Split Pea Soup
• Wild Rice & Mushroom Soup
• Skillet Cornbread with salted butter

Festive Cocktail:

• Vanilla Pear Sour

Dinner:

• Herb-Roasted Turkey (upside-down)
• Buttermilk-Poblano Gravy
• Cornbread Dressing with Bacon & Sage
• Cranberry Relish with Apple Cider
• Herb-Scented Mashed Potatoes
• Sweet Potato Spoon Bread
• Slow-Roasted Carrots with Browned-Butter Vinaigrette
• Roasted Cauliflower & Chickpeas with Mustard Vinaigrette
• Pumpkin Pie Bars with optional whipped cream
• Brown-Butter & Vanilla Bean Apple Pie with optional whipped cream or vanilla ice cream

Leftover Dishes:

• Turkey Stock
• Sweet Potato Biscuits

Yes! My cat, Franklin “the Fluff,” has an Instagram page. ❤