Holiday Snowball Cookie Recipe

Here's the cookie recipe I promised you yesterday. They really are not hard to make at all!

Holiday Snowball Cookies

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups butter, softened (3 sticks) Make sure softened!
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 Tbsp vanilla
1/2 tsp. salt
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 2/3 cups Nestles Toll House Swirled Holiday Morsels (10 oz. pkg)
1/2 cup finely chopped nuts (I use pecans)
Powdered sugar

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

1. Beat butter, sugar, vanilla, and salt in large mixing bowl until creamy.
2. Gradually beat in flour.
3. Stir in morsels and nuts.
4. Shape into 1 1/4 inch balls. (I use a cookie dough scoop)
5. Place on ungreased (or parchment paper) baking sheets.
6. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until cookies are set and lightly browned.
7. Remove from oven and sift powdered sugar over hot cookies.
8. Cool on baking sheets for 10 minutes and then move to wire racks. Sprinkle with additional powdered sugar if desired.

Makes 40-45 snowballs.

I got this recipe from a Nestle Toll House recipe card and it says makes 4 1/2 dozen. It depends on the size of your scoop I guess because I've never gotten that many out of a batch. Probably if you just do spoonfuls you may, but I like the scoop because it makes cookie into a good shape. I have been making these cookies for years. They're always a hit! Enjoy!

The Christmas Baking Continues...

Yesterday I wrapped some more presents and went to the store to get the missing ingredients I didn't have for my baking. Greg helped me out last night by doing step one of my peanut butter patty cookies so that was greatly appreciated. Today I went to town and got a lot of my baking done. First up was more pretzel buttons. Evan got in on the action today and helped me with those. He was such a hoot as we made them. The things he was saying cracked me up. I'll tell you some of them along the way. He was so excited to help so we started by peeling all the wrappers from the Hugs. That's probably the only bad part about making the pretzel buttons, but with Evan's help it went really fast. At first Evan says, "Unwrapping these is more fun than eating them." I was a little shocked by that, but about a minute later he says, "Mommy, touching this candy makes me want to eat them." I think this was his start to many lines to come in order to try to get some to eat. We unwrapped two bags of Hugs and as we neared the end there was a broken one. I gave the broken piece to Evan and he says, "These babies are soooo good." My response, "No Evan you're not having more." He was trying everything to eat the Hugs, believe me! Once we got the Hugs unwrapped Evan was a super big helper spreading the pretzels out and topping them with the Hugs. I put the M&M's on because that part kind of needs to be done fast. We ended up making about 160 pretzel buttons which makes a total of about 225 all together because I made about 65 the other day.

Next up was my peanut butter patties. About 10 years ago when I was doing a long term substitute teaching job in Grand Rapids, a teacher made these for the Christmas party and I was hooked. I've been making them ever since. They taste like the Girl Scout peanut butter patties, but after having them together I think these taste even better. They are so easy to make as well. Three ingredients once again... here's the recipe:

Peanut Butter Patties

Ingredients:

• 1 package chocolate Candi-quick ( I think the Meijer brand tastes best)
• Ritz crackers (about 60 if use a whole package of Candi-quick)
• peanut butter

Directions:

1. Peanut butter the bottom side of a Ritz cracker, top with a second Ritz cracker (so both bottom sides of crackers are touching the peanut butter and you basically have two Ritz crackers with peanut butter in the middle- ).
   
2. Melt Candi-quick according to package directions.
3. Dip cracker in Candi-quick so completely covered.
4. Set on wax paper to harden.

Makes about 30 cookies.

You kind of have to work fast before the Candi-quick hardens. You may need to put tray of chocolate back in the microwave to soften as you're making this. I only do in 15 second intervals because after a couple times the chocolate can tend to get clumpy. Here's what they look like. I basically whip the chocolate on so they're not the prettiest cookie with smooth chocolate like the Girl Scout peanut butter patties, but they're soooo good!


The pretzels in the middle are Evan's own concoction. We had some pretzels left over from the "buttons" and a little chocolate from the cookies. He wanted to dip the pretzels and put teddy grahams in the middle. Pretty clever, huh? He had to make one for each of us! He also made a couple "buttons" with the Hug in the middle and a teddy graham on top instead of the M&M's.

I had to take a break from baking until this evening because I forgot the margarine had to soften for my "Holiday Snowball Cookies." I wasn't going to make these this year, but Greg requested them and I had a bag of the holiday morsels so I made them. I forgot that these too are pretty easy to make. A few more steps than the "pretzel buttons" and "peanut butter patties," but not too bad nonetheless. Here's what they look like:


I will post the recipe tomorrow for them. Because I'm tired and ready for bed soon. I was lucky to get the dough made for these because just as I finished mixing my hand mixer when on the fritz and pretty much burned up. Santa, I need a new hand mixer! So overall, I made 160 pretzel buttons, 31 peanut butter patties, and 43 holiday snowball cookies today. I don't think I'm done because I will probably make another batch of the peanut butter patties as they're being requested. I'm also still debating about making my Santa cookies. I usually make chocolate and white chocolate dipped pretzel rods, but since I discovered the pretzel buttons I think those are going to win over the pretzel rods from now on! Before I leave you, here's a picture of what the Candi-quick looks like if you're unfamiliar with Candi-quick and the holiday morsels for the snowball cookies. (Just a FYI- these can be hard to find sometimes so if you see them grab them. I usually see them at Meijer, but the closer to Christmas it gets they run out.)

The Christmas Baking Has Begun

Tonight we had our friend Brenda over for dinner. She used to work with Greg until she was one of the five who lost their job a month ago when they layoffs were announced. She's having back surgery on Wednesday and she's going to be laid up for a couple weeks from surgery. So I thought it would be nice to have her and her daughter over for dinner with everything that's been going on. I made lasagna for dinner, and I didn't really have anything for dessert so I thought I'd start my holiday baking! I decided to start off with something new I've never made before. When we were at the work Christmas party number one someone brought these pretzels with Hershey kisses and they were so good. I knew they'd be super simple to make so I whipped them together today. They take absolutely no time to make and believe me when I say they are so yummy! I think they're going to be a new tradition to make along with my other regular Holiday baking goods! Here's the recipe if you want to call it a recipe. Basically it's three items and about 10 minutes of your time. There's a few different names for them so I've included all below!

Chocolate Pretzel Buttons/ Pretzel Hugs/ Pretzel Kisses
Ingredients:
1 bag of small round pretzels
1 bag of Hershey Kisses or Hugs
1 bag plain M&M's

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees
2. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper
3. Fill cookie sheet with as many pretzels as will fit
4. Top each pretzel with a Hershey Kiss or Hug (the Hugs melt faster than the kisses)
5. Place in oven for 2-5 minutes (I used Hugs so two minutes was plenty) and remove when Hug/Kiss begins to soften just enough to press M&M in the middle.
6. Top each with a M&M. (I used holiday M&M's so they were green and red)
7. Place in fridge for about 15 minutes until chocolate firms up.
   

Enjoy because they won't last long! I'm already planning on making more! Here's what they look like!


Hopefully by this weekend I'll have the rest of my baking done. I'm trying to narrow down what I'm going to make this year. I have a couple things I make every year and then some years alternate some of the cookies I make!