Happy Holidays!

My greetings are perhaps a bit  early, but I won't be on the schedule again until after the holidays are over, so I just didn't want to miss a chance to wish everyone all the best, and to extend my thanks to all of the readers who visit this blog.  You're the best!  :)

I had a Thanksgiving themed book out last month (The Loner's Thanksgiving Wish) and have a book out this month as well--Duty To Protect,  which is a Love Inspired Suspense set during a very snowy winter in Colorado and Montana.  Brrrrrr!  I'm glad it was Emma and not me,  trapped in a frigid horse trailer crossing Nebraska!

Early forecasts for the Upper Midwest indicated that we were going to have an unusually cold and snowy winter,  just as I wrote in the book, but so far we're still having lovely forty degree days (far nicer than thirty below!) and have had just a single whisper of snowflakes one day.   But even though the weather is still lovely, I've got our Christmas decorations up and now need to start baking. How about you--are you set for the holidays?

I'd like to share the best recipe I've ever found for cut-out cookies, one especially great for when you're baking with small kids.  As much as you work with it, reforming the odd bits and pieces into a ball and rolling it out again, it still stays nice to work with.   I've used this since the early 1980's.  Once, while reaching for the nutmeg, I knocked a container of chili powder into the bowl, the lid came off and the entire container emptied over the cookie dough.  I removed what I could, then added ample cocoa powder to cover the taste--and everyone still loved them.  Now, this is one very forgiving recipe!  :)

Super Easy Roll-out Cookies    --The Rustands

 

1 cup shortening           1 ½  tsp cream of tartar

1 ½ cups sugar              1 tsp soda

2 eggs                           ½ tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla                  4 cups flour

2 Tbsp milk                       

optional: 1 tsp cinnamon  and/or  1 tsp nutmeg

 

You can drop these on a  cookie sheet and flatten with a fork, or use for cut-out cookies.  We like to double the recipe, and roll them out  quite thin.  350 degrees, 8-10 minutes.  My favorites are the ones liberally decorated with cinnamon red hots candy!

Roxanne Rustand

www.roxannerustand.com