VAM Christmas Cookies

Every Christmas, my grandpa would make DOZENS of these cookies. He was very secretive of this recipe... So I'm putting it online to share with my family. After digging through recipes, one of my aunts found a copy in his handwriting (photo to come). These are a type of Fruitcake Cookies. Anything in italics was not on the card, but based off of observations of the care he took to make the cookies.

• 3 ½ Cups Flour
• 1 Cup Shortening
• 2 Cups Brown Sugar
• 2 Eggs
• 1 Teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1 Teaspoon Salt
• 1 Cup Buttermilk
• 1 ½ Cups Diced Pecans
• 1 Cup Candy Cherries (½ Green & ½ Red)
•  1 Cup Candy Pineapple
• 2 Cups Candied Dates

1. Mix everything together. 
2. Spoon dough into balls. Place whole pecan on center and press down. Place on greased cookie sheet. 
3.  Bake at 375°F for 12 minutes.

Old Fashion Apple Crisp

5 Cup Apples, Peeled and Sliced (about 5-6 apples)
2/3-3/4 Cups Packed Brown Sugar
2 Tsp. Lemon Juice
1/3 Cup Butter (softened, not melted)
1/4 tsp. Salt
1 Cup Rolled Oats
1/2 Cup Flour
1 tsp. Cinnamon
1/2 tsp Nutmeg (optional)
1/2 tsp. Allspice (optional)

Apples:

1. Combine Apples, and lemon juice in bottom of greased 9/13 pan.
2.  Dust with cinnamon and 1/4 Cups brown sugar

Crisp:

1.  Combine flour, the rest of the brown sugar, spices, salt and rolled oats until well mixed. 
2. Add Butter and mix until crumbly
3. Sprinkle over apples 

Baking:

1. Bake at 350°F for 30 minutes or until apples are tender.
2. Serve with ice cream or whipped cream 

Variations:

• To make a berry crisp, use 4 cups mixed frozen berries. No lemon juice needed. Decrease cinnamon to 1/2 tsp.
• For Dutch Oven Cooking: Line dutch oven with aluminum foil. Prepare crisp in the same way. For apples, use one can of sprite instead of lemon juice so the apples don't dry out when cooking. Use 5-6 coals on bottom and 12-14 coals on top of 12" dutch oven. Bake for 1 hour or until apples are cooked. 

Coffee Cake

This is one of our family's favorite breakfast meals. My brother requested that I send it to him in Colombia so I finally took the time to type it up. Originally it is in the Betty Crocker Cookbook. Have I ever mentioned how much I love that lady? Yes I know she doesn't really exist but that's a secret.




Batter                                                             Streusel
  2 cups flour                                                    2/3 cup Packed brown sugar
  1 cup sugar                                                    1/2 cup flour
  3 tsp baking powder                                       1 tsp. Ground cinnamon
  1/3 c butter or margarine                                1/3 cup softened butter or margarine
  1 tsp. Salt
  1 egg
  1 cup milk

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare streusel by combining all the ingredients together until it is crumbly. Make the batter by combining all ingredients in a large mixing bowl on low speed for 30 seconds. Beat on med speed for 2 minutes scraping the sides of the bowl occasionally. Spread half of the batter in a greased 9x13 pan. Sprinkle half of the streusel mixture. Top with remaining batter then the rest of the streusel mixture. Bake for 35-40 minutes. 

Update:

Ok so remember how I am horrible for cooking for one person. This recipe makes wayyyy too much for one person. My solution? Make muffins instead! Spoon roughly 1/4 cup of batter into paper wrapper lined muffin tins. Add 1 tbsp. streusel, and another dollop of batter and another tbsp. of streusel. Makes about 1 dozen muffins. You can freeze the muffins at this point or bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes (this is less time than the normal pan way).