CANDY CANE DAY: History of Candy Canes & What to do with Leftover Candy Canes

December 26 is Boxing Day, but it's also Candy Cane Day. Do you have a lot of candy canes left over? Are they still hanging on the tree? Grab a few and make one of these easy recipes! Chocolate and Candy Canes are a great post-holiday treat!

History of the Candy Cane: 

During the 17th century, Europeans adopted Christmas trees as part of Christmas celebrations, and they often made cookies and sugar stick candy as decorations. The first historical reference to the familiar cane shape goes back to 1670, when the choirmaster at the Cologne Cathedral in Germany, bent the sugar sticks into canes to represent a shepherd's staff. The all white candy canes were given out to children during the nativity services. This tradition of handing out candy canes during Christmas services spread throughout Europe and later to America.

The first historical reference to the candy cane in America goes back to 1847, when German immigrant August Imgard decorated the Christmas tree in his Wooster, Ohio home with candy canes.

About fifty years later the first red-and-white striped candy canes appeared. No one knows who exactly invented the stripes, but Christmas cards prior to the year 1900 showed only all white candy canes. Christmas cards after 1900 showed illustrations of striped candy canes. Around the same time, candy-makers added peppermint and wintergreen flavors to their candy canes and those flavors then became the traditional favorites.

1. Hot Chocolate with Candy Canes! Use the candy cane as a stirrer. It will eventually melt and flavor your hot chocolate, coffee, or tea. Of course, a chocolate dipped candy cane is even better!

2. Candy Cane Chocolate Marshmallows. Dip marshmallows in melted dark chocolate and roll in crushed Candy Canes.

3. Candy Cane Truffles

4. Candy Cane Fudge

5. Chocolate Candy Cane Cookies

6. Chocolate Candy Cane Bark

7. Chocolate Covered Candy Canes

8. Chocolate Candy Cane Cheesecake

9. Chocolate Candy Cane Trifle

10. Peppermint Stick Cake:

SCONES FOR THE HOLIDAYS!

Scones are the perfect pastry for the holiday season! There are so many varieties, but being that we're in the holiday season, I thought I'd post a great recipe for Christmas Scones.

A scone is the perfect accompaniment to a cup of tea, and I imagine you'll need lots of cuppas during the holidays. I serve my scones with clotted cream and jam, but then my grandmother spent many years in England, and we adopted some of the British ways of eating and drinking.

Scones like biscuits are made from flour, leavening, a little salt, some fat, milk, and a bit of sugar. As in making biscuits, you cut the fat into the dry ingredients, add liquid, roll, and bake. But that's where the similarity ends. The texture of a scone is completely different from that of a biscuit. Scones are denser, drier, and more crumbly. They usually contain less butter, too. One other main difference is that in the making of scones, you use your hands to massage the butter into the dry ingredients. This will help create the proper texture.

This recipe for Scones is originally from Epicurious. You can change up the nuts and fruits for different seasons, but here's one especially for the Winter holidays.

CHRISTMAS SCONES

Ingredients
1 cup plus 2 Tbsp sugar
2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice, divided
3 cups all purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1 Tbsp finely grated lemon peel
1 tsp salt
3/4 cup chilled unsalted butter, diced
1 cup dried sweetened cranberries (I use Trader Joe's unsweetened)
1/2 cup coarsely chopped walnuts
1/2 cup (or more) chilled half and half, divided

Directions
Position rack in top third of oven; preheat to 375°F.
Line baking sheet with parchment paper.
Whisk 2 Tbsp sugar and 1 Tbsp lemon juice in bowl for glaze.
In large bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, lemon peel, salt, and 1 cup sugar. Add chilled butter; using fingertips, rub in until coarse meal forms. Mix in cranberries and walnuts. Add 1/2 cup half and half and 1 Tbsp lemon juice. Toss with fork until dough comes together in moist clumps, adding more half and half if dough is dry.
Gather dough into ball; divide in half. Press out each half on floured surface to 6-inch-diameter (1-inch-high) round. Cut each round into 6 wedges.
Transfer to baking sheet; brush with glaze.
Bake scones until golden and tester comes out clean, about 18 minutes.

DECADENT EGGNOG BROWNIES: Eggnog Day!

Christmas Eve is also National Eggnog Day. Let's celebrate! If you're like me, you have eggnog around this time of year, and Santa doesn't always partake. So how else to use Eggnog? Eggnog Brownies! Eggnog adds extra richness.

This amazing recipe is from Amy Guittard's Guittard Chocolate Book...no surprise there! I love Guittard Chocolate, and the recipes in Amy's cookbook are fantastic. These brownies are absolutely delicious! I And, as always, use the very best chocolate and Eggnog!

Decadent Eggnog Brownies

Ingredients
6 ounces Guittard 100% Cacao Unsweetened Chocolate, chopped
1 cup + 2 Tbsp unsalted butter
4 large eggs, plus 1 egg yolk, divided
2 1/2 cups plus 4 Tbsp granulated sugar, divided
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 tsp salt
1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
16 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1/4 cup eggnog
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg

Directions
Preheat oven to 350°F.
Line 9 x 9 x 2 inch pan with foil covering the bottom and extending up sides.
Melt unsweetened chocolate and butter in medium microwave safe bowl at medium power (50% or level 5) mixing at 30-second intervals until smooth and all of chocolate is melted. Set aside.
In large bowl of stand mixer, fitted with paddle attachment, beat eggs, sugar, vanilla, and salt at high speed for about 2-3 minutes or until light and creamy. Blend in melted chocolate at low speed, stopping to scrape sides as needed. Add flour just until incorporated.
Spread two-thirds of the batter into prepared pan and transfer remainder to a small bowl.
Clean bowl and paddle of stand mixer and refit to mixer. Beat egg yolk on medium-high until frothy. Stir in 4 tablespoons granulated sugar, eggnog, vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Beat in cream cheese until mixture is smooth.
Top  brownie batter with cream cheese eggnog mixture, using spatula to level out mixture. Spoon remaining brownie batter over cream cheese eggnog layer, again using spatula to spread evenly. Drag the spatula through pan to create marbled effect.
Bake about 45 minutes to an hour or until top is puekered and cracked and toothpick inserted in center is moist (DO NOT OVERBAKE!)
Cool before cutting.

CHOCOLATE FIGGY PUDDING: History, Recipe, & Figgy Pudding Cat Xmas Cards

"Now! Bring us some figgy pudding and bring some out here!"

How long have you been singing this Christmas Carol? Have you ever had Figgy Pudding aka Christmas Pudding? And what, exactly is it?

One other question you might ask, can you add chocolate? Yes! Scroll down for Ghirardelli's recipe for Chocolate Figgy Pudding.

Figgy Pudding is pretty much exactly what it sounds like -- a pudding/cake with figs in it. The reason that it's in such high demand, though, has more to do with its inedible ingredients. Coins, rings and other trinkets were often hidden in the Christmas pudding and each supposedly predicted the recipient's fortune for the coming year. For example, if you found a coin, you would become wealthy. If you found a ring, you'd get married ... and so on. Think of it as an Old English fortune cookie.

From WiseGeek.com:

It's amazing what a brief mention in one Victorian-era Christmas carol can do for an obscure little dessert called figgy pudding. Every year, thousands of people around the world become curious about the dessert mentioned in the secular English carol "We Wish You a Merry Christmas." Apparently, the party-goers mentioned in the lyrics refuse to leave until they get some of this pudding from their host. This must be some seriously good pudding.

In actuality, figgy pudding is more of a cake than a pudding. There have been recipes for it since the 15th century, although its popularity as a Christmas dessert probably reached its peak during the late 19th century. Several factors have significantly hampered the wholesale expansion of the figgy pudding industry, including an interminably long cooking time, an exotic ingredients list and a cringe-inducing dependency on saturated fats for texture.

There are numerous recipes for this pudding, from a traditional steamed version similar to modern bread pudding to a pastry-covered blend of figs, dates, fruits and spices. Nearly all recipes call for three or four hours of steaming. This is accomplished by placing a metal bowl with the pudding mixture into a larger bowl partially filled with boiling water. The indirect heat generated by the boiling water cooks the dessert evenly and slowly. This is equivalent to using a bain marie water bath for individual ramekins filled with batter.

Ghirardelli Chocolate Figgy Pudding


Ingredients
3 eggs
1-1/2 cups brown sugar
4 cups soft bread crumbs
1 cup finely chopped suet (I use unsalted butter)
2 Tbsp flour
1-1/2 cups chopped dried figs
3/4 cup Ghirardelli's Ground Chocolate
1/2 cup hot milk
3/4 tsp salt

Directions:
Beat eggs, add sugar, bread crumbs, suet, figs (dredged with flour), chocolate mixed with hot milk, and salt, stir thoroughly.
Steam three hours in a greased mold.
Serve hot with a hard sauce.

Hard sauce: Great recipe at The Pioneer Woman

Merry Christmas!