Friends, it's here! The season of cinnamon buns and snow scones, egg bakes and breakfast cake, shortbread and rum balls, ham and mustard sauce, glogg and tangerine spritzes. My ham is currently thawing in the fridge, and early next week, I'll make my grandmother's mustard sauce, the condiment that steals the show every year. On Tuesday, I'll make an almond torte or orange and olive oil cake both of which keep well for days and are loved by all. I've included all of my favorite Christmas Eve,...

When I read in Zoe Francois’ latest book, Zoe Bakes Cookies, that the trick to making crinkle cookies is to double dip the dough balls, once in granulated sugar and then in confectioners’ sugar, I was intrigued. I had made crinkle cookies in the past, but never with great success, never with dramatic cracks running across the surfaces, never with the texture I had desired. In the intro to the recipe, Zoe describes these crinkles as both “fudgy and crunchy at the same time,” which sounded...

Hello Friends, A few weeks ago, a woman commented on this chewy chocolate sugar cookie recipe saying she loved all things peppermint and was planning on rolling the unbaked cookies in “peppermint dust.” I had never heard of peppermint dust but quickly learned from an online search it is simply candy canes that have been pulverized into “dust.” I loved the sound of this because I, too, love all things peppermint but I’ve never loved candy canes. A few days later, the woman wrote back saying:...