Written by Ann
Sugar cutouts, nut tossies, chocolate chip, oatmeal lacies, it’s the most wonderful time of the year! Nothing tempts me more than the treats my mother bakes at Christmas. For over fifty years, Mom has baked dozens and dozens and dozens of Christmas cookies in several varieties to satisfy her big family.
Most are part of our family tradition now. It just wouldn’t be Christmas without peanut butter crisscross cookies, or nut-filled kiffles. Everyone appreciates yet another attempt to get a few of the sugar-sprinkled camel-shaped cutouts to survive the oven with their legs intact. Two years ago, Mom packed a shoebox with her Christmas cookies and shipped them to my nephew who was fighting in Iraq. Her nut tossies were so good, they earned her a marriage proposal from one of the soldiers!
Please share the recipes for Christmas cookies and treats that are favorites for your families. I’ll start by sharing the recipe for my mom’s nut tossies, guaranteed to make a soldier fall in love!
Nut Tossies
3 oz. cream cheese
½-cup butter + 1 Tablespoon butter
1-cup flour
1 egg, lightly beaten
¾-cup brown sugar
1 cup finely chopped walnuts or pecans, divided
Preheat the oven to 350°F.
Make the crusts: mix the cream cheese, ½-cup butter, and flour together into soft dough. Let the dough sit at room temperature for an hour.
Make the filling: mix the egg, brown sugar, and ⅔-cup chopped nuts together in a small saucepan. Cook over medium heat until bubbly, for a minute. Remove from the heat.
Divide and shape the dough into 36 balls. Press each into a tossie pan, shaping the crust with your fingers. Fill ⅔ full with the cooked filling. Sprinkle with the remaining chopped nuts.
Bake at 350°F for 13 minutes, then reduce the oven temperature to 250°F and continue baking for 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and let the tossies cool. Makes 36.
Tags: chocolate chip, christmas cookies, christmas recipes, christmas traditions, Holiday baking, nut tossies, oatmeal lacies, Sugar cutouts
Yum Ann, your mom is the cookie queen of Christmas! Oatmeal Lacies sound delicious. I love oatmeal cookies.
My mom has switched some of the things that she made from our childhood. She still makes her peanut butter fudge every year as do I. This is one of the candies she used to make for us and it fell off as we got older. It really is sweet. But, I’m making some this year. I called for the recipe and it’s one of the ones that’s not exact, but very easy.
I’ve edited the below recipe. My mom hadn’t made it for awhile and didn’t have the right amount for the powdered sugar. I was just making a double batch. There’s going to be so much. It’s all correct now.
Peanut Butter Roll
3 lbs powdered sugar (you might need more for the right dough consistency)
1/2 Can Evap Milk (again, might need more for the right consistency)
1 1/2 tsp of soft butter/margerine
1 tsp vanilla
Peanut butter to spread
Add all the ingredients except for the peanut butter. You want a dough the consistency of a pie crust so add either more milk or powdered sugar to get it there. It’s supposed to end up not quite to the flaky stage. Spread some powdered sugar and roll out the dough unto wax paper into a long rectangle about 1/4 inch thick.
Spread the peanut butter. Pick a long side and start rolling tightly. Let it a set a few minutes and then cut w/a sharp knife or a string. Seal tight and refrigerate. (they taste best at room temp)
Yum cookies!
What is a tossie pan? It sounds good and I’d like to try this year for something new.
Here’s mine:
Butterscotch Cookies
7 cups of cornflakes or cheerios
2 cups of peanut butter
One bag of butterscotch chips
Melt all ingredients together in a pan, slowly adding the cornflakes one cup at a time
Scoop one tablespoon of ingredients at a time while still warm on to wax paper.
Let cool for 1 1/2 hours.
Enjoy!
They are my favorite!
Even though it’s early yet on this thread, I think it would be fun to make every cookie recipe people post here. Wouldn’t my family be happy. Okay, it probably won’t happen, but the recipes above sure look good. I wouldn’t mind hearing more about those Oatmeal Lacies, either. I love to make Snickerdoodles around this time of year, but thought I would share the recipe for a ‘cookie in a jar’ my son gave family members as gifts one year.
Country Oatmeal Cookie in a Jar
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup rolled oats
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup chocolate chips (or 1/2 cup chips, 1/2 cup nuts optional)
(The above ingredients are what go into the jar as the gift. Layer the ingredients in the order listed into a quart jar. I seem to remember needing to pack the ingredients pretty firmly. We created a tag with the cooking instructions and attached it to the lid.)
Cooking Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
You will also need the following ingredients:
3/4 cup butter (1 1/2 sticks), softened
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
Beat butter, eggs, and vanilla until well combined. Add entire contents of jar, mixing by hand.
Drop by heaping tsp. onto baking sheet and bake 12-15 minutes.
Cincymom, a tossie pan is a miniature muffin pan.
Craftymomof3, I have a similar recipe with Rice Krispies instead of Corn Flakes. Yummy! They are like candy.
Mary, I LOVE getting layered cookie mixes. They make it baking so easy!
Popcorn Balls
My family loves to make and eat Popcorn Balls at Christmas time. We do not make them in the traditional way with Karo Syrup. That really is a disaster in the making for dental work if you ask me. We make them like Rice Krispie Bars.
I start off by popping a large grocery bag full of popcorn. I usually use my air popper because there is a lot less seeds when you make popcorn that way.
Then I melt one stick of butter in a large pan ( 10 quart). Once the butter is melted throw in one bag of marshmallows and stir slowly on low heat until completely melted. Add some red or green food coloring. A grocery bag full of popcorn usually makes two batches of Popcorn Balls so I make one batch green and one batch red. Then poor about 1/2 bag of popcorn into the pan and stir quickly.
With your hands greased with butter, form balls and drop on wax papa or foil and let cool.
They are so good.
Peanut Clusters or Haystacks
Another really easy way to make candy is to melt one package of butterscotch chips and one package of chocolate chips in a double boiler on low heat. Add your choice of nuts and stir thoroughly. Drop with a spoon on wax paper and let cool. These will make your traditional peanut clusters and they actually taste pretty good for how simple they are.
You can add coconut instead of nuts and it makes a really nice Haystack.
I need to find my recipe for fudge that my brother-in-law makes and gave to me. It is really quite easy to make and pretty tasty.
I am going to try it with rice crispies…that sounds good!
My girlfriend owns a deli/ cafe and we are going to go in Saturday and use her convection oven. Six women are going to double/ triple recipes and bring two recipes each. We can make 8 sheets (triple sized cookie sheets) at a time! I need some simple, but yummy ideas for this cookie exchange. Mix it up quick and bake it, basically. Nothing tricky and we’re trying not to use burners. Any help would be appreciated.
Peanut Butter Bon Bons
2 Cups Peanut Butter
1 ½ Cups Butter
16 oz. (4 ½ Cups) Sifted Powdered Sugar
3 Cups Rice Crispy Cereal
1-6oz. Pkg. Butterscotch Chips
1-6 oz. Pkg. Semisweet Chocolate Chips
In saucepan, melt peanut butter & butter.
In large bowl, combine sugar & cereal; pour peanut butter mixture over cereal and blend together with hands.
Form into ½ inch balls and chill until firm.
Melt chips in double boilers & dip half of candies in each coating. Place on waxed paper and chill.
Oooh Pam those sound great. Thanks for sharing!
Her nut tossies were so good, they earned her a marriage proposal from one of the soldiers! – Ann
Loved that!
These all sound wonderfully and sinfully delicious.
I remember Nancy had some good ones last year. Hope she shares them again.
Here is a recipe that Jennie and I tried this weekend. It involves Butterscotch chips. Those seem to be very popular around here – with very good reason!
Butterscotch Gingerbread Cookies
Ingredients
-3 cups all-purpose flour
-2 teaspoons baking soda
-1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
-1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
-3/4 teaspoon ground cloves
-1/2 teaspoon salt
-1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
-1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margerine, softened
-1/3 cup mild molasses
-1 large egg
-11 oz package of Butterscotch Flavored Morsels
Preheart oven to 350F.
Combine flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, clvoes and salt in a bowl.
Beat sugar, butter, molasses and egg in large mixer bowl until creamy. Gradually beat in flour mixture until well blended. Stir in morsels. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheets.
Bake for 9-11 min. Cool on wire rack.