Tailor's Buttons

I originally published this post on Dec. 14, 2014.

 

Many years ago, when middle child was in second grade, he was in a "literature enhancement group" at school.  They read a series of books together, and then at the end of the series, the children had a large celebration party.  We were to send in something for the kids to eat that was related to the stories that they had read.  One of the books they read was a story about a tailor. As son and I tried to figure out what to make, I began to fixate on these things.  I'd had them before, but I couldn't remember what they were called.  Desperate for something quick and easy, we decided to call these things "Tailors Buttons".  The premise is very simple.  A pretzel, topped with a Hershey Kiss, topped with an M & M.  When I made them years ago, I used the circular pretzels, so that they would look more like buttons than this iteration does.  I still vividly recall the frustration involved with figuring out how high to set the oven, and how long to put these things into the oven.  I destroyed a full bag of Kisses before I finally struck upon the magic combination of time and temperature required to make these wonderful little concoctions.  They have become a family favorite!

Tailor's Buttons

Ingredients:

1 Bag of Pretzels

1 Bag of Hershey Kisses

1 Small Bag of M&M's

*Note - I have yet to find a way to make this recipe gluten and dairy free.  I'm still searching.  Let me know if you know of any gluten and dairy free version of M&M's and Hershey Kisses.  I really would love to know

Step 1: Pre-Heat oven to 350*.  Place pretzels in an even layer across the bottom of a cookie sheet sprayed with non-stick cooking spray.

Step 2: Unwrap all the Kisses and place each one on a pretzel.

 

Step 3:  Put the cookie sheet into the pre-heated oven for 5 minutes.  Check after 3 minutes, and every minute there after.   If the Kisses are soft and beginning to melt, pull them out.  It's really, really, really easy to burn the Kisses - a minute or two can make a big difference.

Step 4: Working Quickly, push an M & M into the center of each Kiss.  Cool completely before storing.  Make sure the chocolate hardens up again before you remove these guys to a separate storage container.  Note - I put mine in the refrigerator for a while.

The hardest part of this project is cleaning up the wrappers!

Cracker Toffee

The Large Sheet of Molten Goodness

Note: I originally published this last year, on Dec. 3, 2015.  

Do you have a favorite Christmas candy that you come back to year after year?  I have my favorite
candies that are rooted in long memories of time spent with my Dad's family getting ready for the holidays.  We would gather at my Aunt Rosie's house, and spend the days before Christmas making up these favorite confections for Christmas Day.   When my Dad was stationed in Vietnam, we got together and made a large batch of candy for him at Thanksgiving, and shipped it on the day after Thanksgiving.  It arrived to him just before Christmas - a melted mass of candy that he stuck in the fridge and nibbled on for days.
Until the day he died, Dad would make a mass batch of buckeyes, peanut brittle, fudge, and pralines, and then take a handful of each finished candy, toss them all together on a cookie sheet, and melt them together.

All broken up and ready to eat!

Fudge, Pralines, and Buckeyes are the time honored Christmas Candies in our family.  (I am not a fan of peanut brittle.)   The recipes are burned into my head, and I in turn have had my kids memorize them.  20 years ago, I found these delightful things and added them to our must make every year list.  If I have to take desert to a function this time of year, this is what I bring.    They're kind of like a bark, with a saltine base to them.  I experimented at home with the ingredients until I hit it right, and this is the recipe that I've used ever since.  I've posted this before, on my defunct "Mom's View" blog.  I might have also posted it on here before, but I don't think so.

This is my favorite Christmas candies to make.  It is quick and easy, and it is easy to make a vegetarian version.


Here's the recipe:

Cracker Cookies:
Saltine Crackers (1-2 sleeves)  I use Shaar Gluten Free Saltines
2 sticks of butter  (Use Earth Balance Vegan Butter or Coconut Butter to make it vegetarian.)
1 cup of brown sugar
1bag (12-18 ounces) of chocolate chips  (We use Good Life soy, gluten, dairy free chips)
1 cup of nuts, chopped (use your favorite kind of nut, and this part is optional)

Preheat oven to 350*
Line a jelly roll pan with foil, spray with non-stick cooking spray.
Place crackers on the jelly roll pan. Snuggle them up next to each other until the entire pan is covered.
In a small saucepan, melt butter with brown sugar over medium heat. Cook until the mixture comes to a rolling boil.
Pour the butter mixture over the crackers.
Bake the crackers at 350* for five minutes.
Remove from oven, pour chocolate chips evenly over crackers, return to oven for 2 minutes.
Using the back of a spoon, spread the chocolate evenly over the crackers.
Put nuts on top of the chocolate. (optional)
Allow to cool. Put the pan in the fridge... it'll set in about 30 minutes.
Break apart and enjoy!


*Note - I store these in the fridge to keep the chocolate and butters from melting.  

Peanut Clusters

Double Boiler

This post contains Affiliate Links. 

This is one of the easiest recipes you will make all week.  It's quick and easy, but it looks as if you've spent hours and hours on it.  This is also very easy to make into a dairy free version, if need be.  I love making this recipe.  The hardest part is laying out the wax paper ahead of time and finding a double boiler to melt the chocolate.  Not many people have double boilers anymore.  You could probably melt the chocolate in the microwave, but I prefer the consistency of melting it on the stove top.  Somehow, it just seems more Christmassy to me.  :)

(Note: these whip up fast.  I started and finished within an hour this afternoon and then realized I had forgotten to take pictures while I was going.  Don't worry - I'll make up another batch later this week and have one of the kids take pictures as we go.)

Peanut Clusters

Spread wax paper on counter and table tops.  I line cookie sheets with wax paper and then drop the peanut clusters onto the wax paper to cool.  Some people will tell you to spray the wax paper with non-stick cooking spray - but that decision is up to you.

Ingredients:
2 (10 ounce) bags of non-dairy chocolate chips (such as Enjoy Life)
1 pound of roasted peanuts not in the shell.

Place water in the bottom pan, and then put the top pan over the water.  Add chips to the top pot, and set the heat at medium.  Stir the chips occasionally until the chocolate is melted.  Add peanuts, a handful at a time,  to the pot, and stir until the peanuts are covered with chocolate.

Remove pot from the heat.  (Turn the heat off) Drop spoonfuls of the chocolate/peanut mixture onto waxed paper.  Let sit until the chocolate hardens. (about an hour)  Remove from wax paper and store in an airtight container.

Cracker Toffee

The large sheet of molten goodness.

 Do you have a favorite Christmas candy that you come back to year after year?  I have my favorite candies that are rooted in long memories of time spent with my Dad's family getting ready for the holidays.  We would gather at my Aunt Rosie's house, and spend the days before Christmas making up these favorite confections for Christmas Day.   When my Dad was stationed in Vietnam, we got together and made a large batch of candy for him at Thanksgiving, and shipped it on the day after Thanksgiving.  It arrived to him just before Christmas - a melted mass of candy that he stuck in the fridge and nibbled on for days.
Until the day he died, Dad would make a mass batch of buckeyes, peanut brittle, fudge, and pralines, and then take a handful of each finished candy, toss them all together on a cookie sheet, and melt them together.

All broken up and ready to eat!

Fudge, Pralines, and Buckeyes are the time honored Christmas Candies in our family.  (I am not a fan of peanut brittle.)   The recipes are burned into my head, and I in turn have had my kids memorize them.  20 years ago, I found these delightful things and added them to our must make every year list.  If I have to take desert to a function this time of year, this is what I bring.    They're kind of like a bark, with a saltine base to them.  I experimented at home with the ingredients until I hit it right, and this is the recipe that I've used ever since.  I've posted this before, on my defunct "Mom's View" blog.  I might have also posted it on here before, but I don't think so.

This is my favorite Christmas candies to make.  It is quick and easy, and it is easy to make a vegetarian version.


Here's the recipe:

Cracker Cookies:
Saltine Crackers (1-2 sleeves)  I use Shaar Gluten Free Saltines
2 sticks of butter  (Use Earth Balance Vegan Butter or Coconut Butter to make it vegetarian.)
1 cup of brown sugar
1bag (12-18 ounces) of chocolate chips  (We use Good Life soy, gluten, dairy free chips)
1 cup of nuts, chopped (use your favorite kind of nut, and this part is optional)

Preheat oven to 350*
Line a jelly roll pan with foil, spray with non-stick cooking spray.
Place crackers on the jelly roll pan. Snuggle them up next to each other until the entire pan is covered.
In a small saucepan, melt butter with brown sugar over medium heat. Cook until the mixture comes to a rolling boil.
Pour the butter mixture over the crackers.
Bake the crackers at 350* for five minutes.
Remove from oven, pour chocolate chips evenly over crackers, return to oven for 2 minutes.
Using the back of a spoon, spread the chocolate evenly over the crackers.
Put nuts on top of the chocolate. (optional)
Allow to cool. Put the pan in the fridge... it'll set in about 30 minutes.
Break apart and enjoy!


*Note - I store these in the fridge to keep the chocolate and butters from melting.  

Halloween Candy

my favorite candy bar.

Note: This post contains affiliate links.

What is your favorite Halloween candy?  Let's be honest, even though we're adults, we all have our favorite Halloween Candy, and we tend to buy that on Halloween, just "in case" we don't give it all out, then we won't mind taking care of it.


When I was a kid back in the 70's, the variety of candy that was handed out was vastly different than it is today.  Red Hots, Good and Plenty, Mike and Ike, Tootsie Pops, and Hundred Thousand Dollar Bars populated our bags, in addition to McDonald's Trick or Treat Prizes and homemade popcorn balls and caramel apples  (Remember, this was a more innocent era.  Popcorn balls were still handed out, but I remember when and why we had to stop giving out homemade goodies for Halloween.)  When Dad was stationed in Ohio, our next door neighbors still made caramel apples with crushed peanuts - but she brought them around to the kids - and handed it off to the parents - during the afternoon of Halloween, so we would know who it came from.

My favorite Halloween candy back then was the little fun size Krackle bars.  In our family, nobody liked the Special Dark bars, and Dad used to hoard those.

When my own kids were little, during the 90's and early 00's the nature of Halloween Candies had changed.  More candy was chocolate based, and more people handed out coupons for free fries or other treats from the fast food restaurants in town.  The people in our neighborhood added a twist, and we'd get toothbrushes and toothpaste samples from the dentist, and passes to the gym from the personal trainer.  We gave out our own packs of non-candy treats.

A vivid memory I have is of my kids, all sitting on the living room floor and sorting their candy.  Our daughter traded away all of her chocolate, but she was a shrewd negotiator.  She ended up with the pencils, crayons, bubbles, and candy necklaces that her brothers scoffed at.

What we're giving our for Halloween this year!  Image: Amazon.

Even though I tend not to hand out candy, that doesn't mean our house isn't full of candy this time of year.  I have a jar full of candy corn that I snack on occasionally.  I also have my favorite candies: fun size Snickers bars and full size Dark Chocolate Coconut bars.  (think Mounds bars, but with the yummy twist of Dark Chocolate.)  And I wonder why I need to lose weight?

I usually pick up 2 bags of the fun size candy bars.  Why?  Because I like to bake Christmas cookies with them....

I'd really like to conduct a very unscientific poll right now.  Among the people who read this blog, WHAT is your favorite Halloween Candy?  Please put a note in the comments.  I'm really, really curious!