Monday Check In

Last week...

Writing Related:  I worked like crazy last week to get the editing done on Coming Home. I'll be sending it to my editor and beta readers on Tuesday. I'll have about 2 weeks to get Christmas things done before they send it back to me with their comments and suggestions. 

 Motivational Quote: "Try not to over-think." ~ Amy Beager  This is always good advice when working on edits or rewrites.

What I'm Reading:  I finished reading The Body in the Backyard by Lucy Score last night. I'm not sure what I'll start reading tonight. I have a stack of 8 books that I borrowed from the library last Wednesday. 

Random Thoughts: I hope everyone that celebrates Thanksgiving has a wonderful holiday with their friends and families. 

Random Photo:

                                            The banana bread I made last week.

Holiday Cookies

Every year we make shortbread cookies to serve on Thanksgiving Day. We make them and put them out for guests who are looking for a snack while dinner is cooking. Some people have them for dessert instead of pie as well. I thought I'd share our recipe this year.

Shortbread Cookies

2 sticks room temperature salted butter
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup confectioners sugar
2 cups all purpose flour

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Grease two 8 inch round cake pans. I use butter Pam spray, but you can also use butter to grease the pans. Set the pans aside.

Beat the butter, sugar, vanilla extract together in a medium sized bowl. Add flour to mixture. If the mixture seems too dry and isn't combining well, add up to 3 teaspoons of water, one at a time until the dough is well mixed. Divide the dough into two parts. Press each part into the cake pans. Prick the dough with a fork in various places. This will keep the shortbread from forming bubbles while baking. Bake each pan for 30 to 35 minutes until the shortbread is a light golden brown.

Immediately remove from the pan. I just dump the pan upside down onto the clean tabletop. Cut into 12 pie shaped wedges. I do this with a pizza cutter. I find it's easier than using a knife. Once the pieces are cut, place them on a rack until completely cool.

Makes 24 pie shaped wedges.

Happy Thanksgiving

I won't be posting this week due to the holiday. I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving with your family and friends.

Friends, Family, and Out of Town Relatives, Oh My

Have you ever looked forward to something and dreaded it happening at the same time?  That's my current dilemma.  I'm having friends, family, and out of town relatives for dinner on Thanksgiving.  Now, I'm not saying that's what I'm dreading.  That's the part I'm looking forward to.

The part I'm dreading is all the prep work for the meal. I have three days to get pies, sweet rolls, and bread rolls made and as many items as I can prepped beforehand for the holiday meal so that I'm not spending the entire day in the kitchen cooking, just a portion of it. 

Thankfully, my mother will help with the baking part.  While I'm slaving away at the day job Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, she'll be making the pie crusts (hers are so much better than mine) and taking care of the bread rolls which take an enormous amount of time between the inital rising, the shaping of the dough into clovers, and then the second rising before they can be baked.  She's also going to be making the bread we'll use to make the stuffing.  Another time consuming process. 

I suppose I could make the holiday less stressful by buying the pies, or the rolls, or making the potatoes and stuffing from a box or bag, but for every holiday that I can remember, my mother always made everything from scratch, nothing from a box, bag, can, or frozen item.  Actually, that's how she taught me to cook everything.  I didn't have a store bought cookie like Chips Ahoy until I was a teenager.  So the thought of opening a can and dumping it in a pan, buying the rolls or the pies just doesn't seem right. 

Thanksgiving is about tradition.  I guess one of the traditions in our house is stressing about getting all that cooking done well and on time.  And we always do, every year.