Christmas Eats
Every year my family does Christmas Eve at my grandparents. The whole family gets together and we eat amazing food and open presents. Its something to look forward to every year! This year we moved this to the 27th, leaving my family to handle Christmas Eve festivities on our own. The first thing that sprung to mind was what are we gonna cook? I threw out some favorites and we ended up making them all: family famous cheese ball, meat and cheese platter, guacamole, and bruschetta with homemade bread. And those were just the snacks. For dinner we made prime rib, mashed potatoes, green beans, sweet potato casserole, and brussel sprouts. For dessert, I made apple pie and pumpkin spice cupcakes with maple cream cheese frosting.
Just so you don't think we are too crazy, we had family friends joining us. Still, we went a little overboard. However, making it all was so much fun. It was for sure the highlight of my break. My dad and I were basically running a restaurant in my kitchen. I handled the desserts and he handled most of the cooking. I have always said that I preferred cooking over baking, but lately that has proved not to be true. I love making dough. Anywhere from bread dough to pie dough. I like the challenge of having to make it perfect. My heart still lies with cooking but baking and I are forming a wonderful relationship.
Since I got all my mistakes out of the way with my pie dough from the pecan pie, I was able to make this one with much more ease. In case you ever wondered, you can make pie dough in a blender. I was worried because I don't have a food processor, but it turned out just fine. Just make sure not to whiz it too much. This apple pie turned out to be a shining star. I got the recipe from the one and only smitten kitchen. On a side note, I got her book for christmas and it's amazing. I highly recommend checking it out. I can always rely on her! Everything about it was delicious. I originally planned on doing the lattice pattern for the top crust, but then chickened out and stuck with a basic overlay. However, I think this worked in my favor, because since the crust covered the whole filling, it helped to seal in the moisture. The openness of a lattice design may lead to a lot of the moisture in the apple filling to evaporate. However, the flavor should remain if you want to experiment with different designs. I almost forgot the last step when making it. Finishing the pie egg wash and sugar allowed for a nice sugar crisp on the outside.
My next endeavor was the pumpkin cupcakes. Surprise, surprise, I also got this recipe from smitten kitchen. Her photography always draws me in. She had pictures of beautiful orange cupcakes with perfect roses piped on top. I was determined to make them just as beautiful. Taste was spot on; however, piping roses was a lot harder than I had anticipated. I rummaged through my garage in my moms old cake supplies, just to find the tip I needed. I found everything I needed, but the icing was just not right for this type of decorating. I would recommend using a more dense icing, such as royal icing, instead of cream cheese icing. This icing is too thin, so when you try and pipe roses, the rose petals melt together and are not as defined as you would want. Taste-wise, the icing was amazing! The maple syrup added a different sweetness, that avoided an overwhelming powdered sugar taste. I decided to pipe small dots all over, which looked like those spiked earrings I used to buy in 5th grade, but it still looked cute. The cake itself is not too sweet, it resembles a muffin. Topping it with cream cheese icing is perfect because it is sweet, but still in line with flavor profile. I have never worked with pumpkin before, but this is the perfect way to use it! Even with my VERY full stomach, I kept going back for more. Overall, it was both delicious and addictive.
You can find both recipes on smitten kitchen, and they are linked in this post. I had so much fun playing baker and can't wait to keep exploring new recipes that I can share!!
