Sugar 'n Spice Christmas Cookies

I used pink icing for these as I had no red in the house - but I still think that they have a pretty, festive feel to them - don't you ?!

What is a home without a fully laden cookie jar (or in our house, a biscuit tin or barrel) over the festive season ?! (You can see the ones I made last year over here) Cookies are easy to make and are enjoyed by everyone. They also store well and are great to have on hand for when unexpected visitors pop around (which, I’ll be honest, does not happen that often on our – rather remote – farm !)

These cookies below make great hostess gifts over the holidays – place them in a pretty tin, nestled on a bed of red and green tissue paper or wrap them in red cellophane and tie with a big green bow & give to someone as a ‘thank you’ or a ‘happy Christmas’ present. You could even write the recipe out on a pretty card and include it with the cookies, so that the recipient can make them themselves sometime.

If you do make these cookies, please remember to leave a few out for Father Christmas to eat when he visits your home on Christmas Eve to deliver all your presents. I know from first hand experience, that he really does enjoy them. Ho ho ho …. Happy Christmas cookie baking, everyone !


Sugar ‘n Spice Christmas Cookies (adapted from the “Sugar Biscuits” recipe by S.J.A. de Villiers “Cook & Enjoy It” book)

½ cup Butter
1 cup Brown Sugar
1 Egg
2 tbsp Milk
½ tsp Vanilla Essence
2 ½ cups Cake Flour
2 tsp Baking Powder
1 ½ tsp ground Cinnamon
1 tsp ground Nutmeg
1 tsp ground Mixed Spice
½ tsp Salt

Cream the butter & sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the egg, milk and vanilla essence & continue beating until well combined. Add the sifted flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, mixed spice and salt. Mix well, kneading to form a dough. Cover & place in the fridge to cool for about an hour before rolling out +- 3 mm thick and using a cookie cutter to cut shapes out. Place on a greased baking sheet and bake at 190’C/375 ’F/Gas Mark 5 for about 10 minutes until golden.

Decorating Ideas :

Allow to cool and decorate with a piping bag filled with coloured icing (or you can cheat like I did, and buy the ready made icing tubes !) You could use white icing to create a snowflake design, and green and red for edging the biscuits or making star designs. You can also use edible gold or silver balls to decorate the cookies for an extra festive look.

Novelty Christmas Crackers

The animal print Christmas cracker in the foreground is handmade here in Tanzania. The red & green foil covered cracker in the background is made in South Africa

(I have my friend Shannon in Texas to thank for the inspiration for this blog post - as it was through her that I discovered that Christmas Crackers aren’t found all over the world and used by everyone at Christmas time – so I decided to write about them & share the tradition with those of you who may not know what they are. Thanks, Shannon !)

Christmas crackers (the novelty type – not the edible ones !) are very much a part of Christmas for us. They always feature on the table at our main Christmas meal (which is lunch time on Christmas day in our home) as part of the table settings. Each person usually finds a cracker on his/her side plate and tradition dictates that they are ‘pulled’ before the meal begins.

The Tanzanian cracker above (which my daughter & I 'pulled' today) is a top quality handcrafted one and contained a green crepe paper 'crown' hat, a handmade African bead necklace and a joke ('Why do lions eat raw meat ? Because they don't know how to cook it !')

The crackers are basically cardboard tubes covered with brightly coloured paper twisted on each side - much like a large wrapped sweet or candy. Inside the cracker you will usually find a paper hat, a really silly joke on a separate piece of paper, and a gift of some sort - plastic toys such as whistles, magnifying glasses etc in the cheaper crackers and nail scissors, key chains etc in the more expensive ones.

The fun in pulling the cracker (with the person sitting next to you) is that it makes a small ‘bang’ when it is pulled, and then everyone is usually left scurrying aound and under the table, looking for their gift ! Everyone then puts their paper hats on (which look like flimsy crowns) & take it in turns reading their corny jokes before the meal begins !

The shop bought cracker contained a red plastic 'crown' hat, a silver paper clip/holder & a joke which read 'What do you call a rocking chair fitted with wheels ? A Rock-and-Roller !'

The story goes that crackers were invented by a man called Thomas Smith in England in 1847. They were created by him as a development of his bon-bon sweets, which he sold in a twist of paper. Sales of bon-bon’s had been slumping, so Smith came up with the idea of adding a motto into the bon-bon wrappers (much like fortune cookies) - after limited success with this, he decided to replace the sweet with a gift and add a ‘crackle’ element by pasting saltpeter (potassium nitrate) on to 2 thin strips of cardboard that when friction was generated by them being pulled apart, created a small ‘bang’. (The inclusion of paper hats and jokes were introduced later on).

I have quite a few Christmas crackers this year, so we will use them for both the Christmas and the Boxing day meal

Over the past few years, Christmas crackers have finally become available in Tanzania - as one of the local leprosy homes makes them and sells them to raise funds each year. In my opinion, these are the best Christmas crackers I’ve ever come across as they are not only beautifully handmade, but also contain lovely quality handmade gifts such as beaded milk jug covers, necklaces and leather key tags. I’ve included some photo’s of these, along with the shop bought variety (these ones pictured come from South Africa) and what the contents look like once pulled – my daughter was thrilled as I let her pull/open 2 of them today so that I could photograph them for the blog !

I believe that Christmas crackers are found in the UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia and a few European countries. Do you have them in your country ? If so, what are they like ? I’d love to hear from readers who have them, and what they are like in each different country.

Happy Christmas cracker pulling, everyone !

'Food, Fun & Farm Life' Christmas Recipe Round Up - Savoury Eats

If you're looking for some Christmas meal inspiration, I've put together some of my favourite recipes for festive meal ideas from last year for you to browse through .......

The 'Cheese & Mustard Straws' pictured above make a great snack to serve with drinks before your meal & as they are quite light, will still leave you with enough of an appetite for the 'main event' ! The recipe for these is over here.

I often serve asparagus as a starter dish on Christmas day .... sometimes with ham & cheese and sometimes with a tangy mustard sauce (as pictured below). You can see my recipe for 'Fresh Asparagus with Mustard Sauce' over here.

Turkey always features on our Christmas table (we have to order them some time in advance as they are usually imported into the country - sometimes from as far afield as Brazil - for the big day) - with a nice stuffing, gravy and cranberry sauce (bought in a jar as cranberries definitely don't grow here !) The 'foolproof' method I used to cook the turkey below, can be seen over here.

What would your Christmas meal be without some 'Perfect Roast Potatoes' ?! You can find my recipe for them over here. This method is so simple and produces the perfect roast potato ... I promise !

Glazed gammon ham with pineapple & cherries also always features on our Christmas table. I do 'cheat' a little though, and buy mine pre cooked. You could also choose to cook a different type of pork dish for a change - my 'Pickled, Smoked Pork Leg' is shown below and in this post over here you will find helpful tips on things like cooking times for various cuts of pork.

If you missed my recent post on the 'Food, Fun & Farm Life' recipe round up for sweet Christmas treats, you can find it over here.

Happy Christmas cooking, everyone !