Baking Goodies

It doesn't surprise anybody who knows me, but I love to cook. I also love to bake. It's a good thing that I have a job and can't devote more time to these two hobbies, because I also like to eat the things I cook and bake. I would be "roughly the size of a barge." As soon as it turns cold outside here in northern Indiana, my oven gets a workout. There are apple pies made from fresh picked, locally grown apples. There is pumpkin pie, sometimes made from pumpkins from my own garden, but not recently. There are dozens and dozens of cookies. There are cakes and brownies.  I think my favorite thing to make and eat around the holidays are my homemade crescent rolls. They have a ton of butter in them, so no wonder they melt in your mouth. I got the recipe from a cookbook my mother-in-law gave to me a long time ago called "Nutbread and Nostalgia" which was put together by the Junior League in South Bend.  You have to use real butter in the rolls, not margarine. I suppose they are mostly bad for your health, but they are oh so good in your mouth!

Another thing that I really love this time of year is home made beef stew. I think if I were going to overeat, I would rather overeat savory foods rather than sweet ones. I usually fill up on a meal and don't have room for dessert. Beef stew is like the ultimate comfort food for me. For some reason, it always reminds me of my mother. She is the one who taught me how to make it. I don't have a recipe. It turns out a little different every time, yet consistenly yummy! When it is cold outside, there is nothing as wonderful as coming into the house and having the savory fragrance of beef stew greeting me from atop the stove or in the crockpot. It's still good a week later. (Insert words of nursery rhyme here..some like it hot, some like it cold, some like it in the pot nine days old!) I am hungry now, and it's only 9:00 a.m.!
At any rate, this is the time of year that I kick the baking into high gear. There has to be a turkey, at least that is what I think there has to be. Sometime during the season, even if I am not hosting the gathering, I have to roast a turkey. There have to be the crescent rolls. I have made two batches already this season. We need at least three kinds of cookies. There are the chocolate chips, the peanut butter with chocolate kisses, and there should be cookie cutter cookies decorated with colored frostings. Tricia will want my pumpkin swirl cheesecake with the ginger snap cookie crust. I want pumpkin pies and almost always, pecan pie. Those are just the basics for the season. I somehow find time to do all of this from the end of November to the beginning of December. Well, I feel I have to do this. IT MUST BE DONE!