The Naptime Chef

My Day So Far: Distributed all the Christmas gift bags, weekly Friday farmers market visit, mushroom soup for mother/daughter lunch.
Naptime Goals: Write timeline for Christmas cooking next week, wrap gifts and hide them (!), make Katie’s Candy for tonight’s party.
Tonight’s Meal: Buccatini Alla’ Amatriciana – a favorite go-to dinner.
Parenting Lesson of the Day: Toddlers love unwrapping presents, even when they are not their own!

The Christmas spirit is alive and well in our house. My daughter has spent the day searching for gifts she suspects I’ve wrapped and hidden from her (she’s right) because she loves nothing more than tearing off paper and bows. Truth be told, I don’t think she really cares about what is actually underneath the paper, she is still at the stage where she just likes the act of unwrapping in general. In keeping with the holiday season we’ve been to several parties lately and we have another tonight. I am not hosting this particular party, but I do plan on taking some homemade Katie’s Candy to the hostess.

I’ve named this after the person who gave it to me because she deserves the credit. Katie has given me some of my favorite recipes over time, and this is yet another one from her treasure trove. Katie actually gave this to me when I was in high school and beginning to make homemade Christmas gifts for my friends. It was the perfect recipe to start with. It only takes a few steps to make, requires four simple ingredients and is unbelievably delicious.

I’ve seen this recipe around in other places and have sometimes heard it referred to as “poor man’s toffee” or “cracker bark.” These names come from the fact that the simple act of baking the butter and sugar over the crackers forms a pure toffee. The unsalted cracker remains as the innocuous core, giving it structure without any undesirable taste. For extra flavor sometimes I like to top the bark with sliced almonds or chopped hazelnuts, but in this particular case I used holiday sprinkles to make it party-perfect.

When I used to make this for my friends I would break up the tray of candy into pieces and put them in clear treat bags. For my friend’s party I will break it into shards, separated the layers with wax paper, and take them to her house in a Tupperware. As you can see by the directions below, the eight minutes of baking time means that preparing this candy while my daughter naps is a snap. The 15 minutes of preparation time is easily one of the fastest ways to prepare toffee that I have ever found. And, happily, the quick preparation time means I can spend the rest of naptime taking care of family holiday gifts – making sure I don’t leave a trace for my daughter to find when she wakes up!

If you have Christmas parties to attend this weekend I guarantee this will be a surefire hit. I know it was for my friend, and it was for my daughter, too. I let her have a nibble after it had fully cooled in the fridge. I think it has become her most favorite part about Christmas, next to the gift unwrapping, of course.

My Day So Far: Manic Thursday! Visited Macy’s Santa-land (can’t help it, I promised my daughter!), picked up gift packaging materials, bakery for fresh baguettes.

Naptime Goals: Finish Peppermint Bark and assemble gift bags, laundry, book sitter for date night.
Tonight’s Meal: Paprika Pork Stew I made last night – it always tastes better the next day.

Parenting Lesson of the Day: It is unwise to let a toddler sample peppermint bark before bedtime.

I know I’ve been clamoring on and on about this all month, but edible Christmas gifts are a thing of mine. I’ve already told you about Apricot Jam, Spiced Walnuts and Peppermint Hot Fudge Sauce, and today I’m going to tell you about Peppermint Bark. I adapted this recipe from one I found in Bon Appetit years and years ago. Since then I’ve seen it turn up on other people’s sites, including here and here. It appears this recipe has many fans, and rightly so. Then, leave it to good ole’ BA, they ended up giving us a recipe on how to use this bark in cookies in the December 2009 issue! They are amazingly delicious, I tell you, but I’ll leave that post for another time.

Peppermint Bark is ubiquitous this time of year, and after sampling many many varieties I can confirm, with a great deal of authority, that this recipe is indeed the best. It has just the right balance of chocolate, sugar and peppermint. It is neither too hard, nor too soft, and I love the way the crushed candies add a nice crunch that won’t break your teeth.

As I mentioned above, I purposely planned ahead with dinner, making Paprika Pork Stew the evening prior and leaving it the fridge for the flavors to marry overnight. This way I had all of my daughter’s naptime to make my batches of Peppermint Bark and get them ready for distribution. In this webisode I show you how I make the peppermint bark – whilst tackling several loads of laundry and catching up on emails – and how they fit into my finished gifts bags. (Parents note: I fit in my chores while the chocolate is chilling.)

My Day So Far: Playdate with daughter, totally random errands (buying toothpaste and balloons?!), mother/daughter grilled cheese lunch.

Naptime Goals: Bake Eggnog Cookies for Ashley’s housewarming, finish online Christmas shopping, Ironing (least favorite chore).
Tonight’s Meal: Leftover Eggplant and Prosciutto Lasagna.

Parenting Lesson of the Day: Do pick up balloons for your friend’s party; don’t take your two year-old with you unless you expect to buy her balloons, too.

*Note: I am thrilled to submit this cookie recipe to the 12 Days of Sharing event taking place at In Jennie’s Kitchen. Jennifer Perillo and her co-hosts are doing a fantastic job using this event to help end hunger, a cause that is especially relevant during the holiday season. I hope you’ll use the donation button to the right of this post to make a donation to Share our Strength this holiday season.

We are all crazed during the holiday season, myself included. As you can see from the list above, my goals these days are ambitious, but no less so than anyone else I know. Everyone seems to be running to and fro, purchasing gifts, rushing to performances and prepping for holiday parties. I find that day to day parenting is a lot of work and adding a major holiday season on top of these duties is enough to send anyone over the edge. To keep myself from crossing to the other side I do my best to plan my days carefully to keep them manageable and reasonable, and to enjoy myself while I get things done. To kick off the celebrations this weekend we are going to our friend’s Ashley and Kevin’s housewarming party at their new home in Westchester, and I am bringing eggnog cookies.

I love baking just as much as I love cooking (as if you couldn’t tell that already!). Over the past year, while the my daughter has graduated from crawling to walking to running full stop, I’ve figured out that if I want a hassle-free baking experience the best time to do it is while she naps, or is out on a weekend activity with her father. Additionally, since I have other things to do while I have free time, like laundry, present wrapping, etc, it is best for me to have dinner already planned so as not to overload myself with too much to do in one two-hour stretch. On this occasion I had my Eggplant and Prosciutto Lasagna in the fridge from the previous night, so all I needed to concentrate on was my eggnog cookies and other chores.

This recipe was given to me by my friend Susan who ripped it off of the back of an eggnog carton a few Christmases ago. Over time I’ve adapted it, adding spices and a little boozy flavor, and changed the topping from an eggnog to a browned butter icing. I prefer the browned butter icing since it has a sweet nutty flavor that works well with the eggnog in the cookies and adds a complexity to the dough rather than icing in the original recipe. Unlike a lot of Christmas cookies these have more shortbread taste, dense and buttery with a hint of spice, they are cakey and less sweet then many more conventional holiday treats.

Since these are so easy to make squeezing cooking baking in along with the rest of my naptime to-do list was not a problem. While they baked I was able to catch up on laundry, and then I iced them after I’d finished my online Christmas shopping. I know Ashley is going to love these when I take them to her house this weekend, and thank goodness I doubled the recipe, because my family loves these, too.

Location: My parent’s house, Cooperstown NY
My Day So Far: Filmed cooking segment for WKTV Utica/Rome, returned emails, leftover butternut squash soup from cooking segment for lunch.
Naptime Goals: Pack suitcases, bake Herbs de Provence Popovers for snack and dinner, wrap Christmas gifts, catch up with Dad.

Tonight’s Meal: My Mom is cooking (yeah – a break for me!)

Parenting Lesson of the Day: Grandparents are helpful to have around.

While visiting my parent’s in Cooperstown this week, I found myself in the mood for a hot savory snack on Monday mid-afternoon. Luckily, since my mom was cooking that evening, during my daughter’s naptime I had two hours completely free for baking projects, suitcase packing, gift wrapping and a quick catch up with Dad. Given my savory craving I opted out of baking yet another batch of Christmas cookies, and instead decided to make my favorite popovers.  A piping hot buttery roll was just the ticket for a chilly afternoon snack, plus I knew they would pair beautifully with our meal that evening.

My favorite part about making popovers is that delicious reward comes from minimal effort. Unlike a complicated butter pastry, this dough can be mix together with relative ease and put straight into the oven. Furthermore, it can be flavored almost any way you like. In my first batch I used my favorite Herbs de Provence, and in the second I added freeze dried chives (there is nothing wrong with freeze dried herbs when fresh aren’t available). Either work well, you could also add cheese, other herbs like rosemary or thyme – or nothing at all!

Many times people have asked me about using specialty popover pans and I assure them that they are definitely not necessary. As I’ve said before, I don’t spend a lot on specialty baking items that only have one purpose. Instead I’ve invested in good quality muffin tins, they are versatile in the kitchen and work beautifully when making big, puffy popovers. If you already have popover pans certainly use them, but they are not going to make or break this recipe.

When I made these my daughter and I almost consumed the entire batch by ourselves. We couldn’t get enough of the flaky butter dough and fragrant herbes de provence. In fact, to be perfectly honest, I got straight to work making another batch the very next day and was thoughtful enough to film it for you. I hope this demonstrates to you how utterly simple these are to make, and how delicious they are to eat. As you will see, making these during my daughter’s afternoon naptime is a snap. In fact, they are also easy enough to make that sometimes I do so when I have five minutes even if she’s awake. I’ve also made these right before guests come over and have served them at dinner or brunch. They are always hit, and you’ll soon see why. Enjoy!

Naptime Chef Popovers from Kelsey Banfield on Vimeo.

Location: Home in New York
My Day So Far: Picked up gift bags for spiced walnuts, 45 minutes at playground with daughter, 20 minutes grocery shopping
Naptime Goals: 2 batches of Spiced Walnuts for Christmas gifts, prepare ham for dinner
Tonight’s Meal: Ham, Carrot Souffle (refrigerator staple), green salad
Preparation: Picked up ham and oranges in the morning, honey already in the pantry.

We had a fantastic Thanksgiving on Martha’s Vineyard, but I am glad it is over. Combining a huge family holiday with a certain toddler’s birthday is never an easy event line-up. Instead of settling on the sofa after Thanksgiving dinner, I revved up the KitchenAid to make a chocolate buttermilk birthday cake with pink frosting and lots of sprinkles (documented below). It was a wonderful weekend of celebration, but when we returned on home on Saturday night I was exhausted. The following morning, while I was writing up my menu for this week, I decided to bid farewell to November and kick-off the Christmas season with my Citrus-Glazed Holiday Ham. After spending a whole month thinking about turkey it felt like the right time to switch gears, and get excited for a whole new month of festivities.

I bake ham year round, but for some reason this particular recipe has always been relegated to my holiday food file. I think the reason is because around this time friends usually send us a shipment of fresh oranges from Florida as an early holiday gift. When those golden beauties arrive I add orange juice and zest to just about everything I make, not stopping until the crate is all used up.

Preparing this ham is a dream come true for any parent who cooks. I am not kidding when I say all I do is drizzle everything over the ham in layers. There is little to no measuring required and, like all my favorite recipes, this is flexible when it comes to the glaze. I most often use orange juice when making this, but I’ve also used the juices of clementines, tangerines and even apricots. Paired with the honey or maple syrup, any of them will create just the right balance of natural sweetness to contrast the salty ham.

Over time I’ve found that the time I choose to bake the ham is flexible, too. Both my husband and I like to eat ham cold just as much as we enjoy it hot, so I typically bake it during my daughter’s afternoon naptime. This way I have dinner fully cooked by 4pm in the afternoon – a convenience that makes my life remarkably easier come evening. If we decide we’d want our slices warm I warm them on a platter in the oven, or give them a quick run through the microwave. It is the best of both worlds, allowing us to choose how we’d like to enjoy our food.

As you can see, the instructions below barely amount to a recipe. Adding this glaze is really all about putting the finishing touches on an already delicious piece of meat. If you have a large ham and are feeding a crowd simply double or triple the quantities below. I have done this before and it makes for an excellent meal to serve on a buffet, or at a more formal dinner. This is also a remarkably kid-friendly dish, my daughter likes to eat the ham sliced thin on toast with a little bit of cheese. In fact, I like to eat it that way, too. When I made it this week we all devoured several slices, along with a serving of carrot souffle. It was just the meal to put us in a festive mood that will last all month long.

By now most of my friends know they are getting Spiced Walnuts for Christmas, and today I am telling them that they are getting Peppermint Hot Fudge Sauce as well. This recipe was given to me by my mother-in-law who got it from her friend, Rhoda Janis, almost 30 years ago. As you all know, I love a good hand-me-down recipe, and this one has really stood the test of time. I think this hot fudge sauce is better than any other I have ever tasted because it is the perfect ratio of chocolate, butter, cream and sugars. Then, to really push the flavor over the top, I add pure peppermint extract to give it a minty candy cane-esque flavor.

If you have friends who don’t like peppermint, like my friend Meghan for example, simply use vanilla extract in lieu of peppermint. This works very well and makes the sauce even more versatile. When I make it like this I am able to drizzle it over poached fruit, berry pavlovas and even slices of bundt cake. The uses are endless, although, I’ll admit, sometimes I just eat it straight out of the jar and don’t even bother with basic vanilla ice cream.

Since this sauce requires stirring over a hot stove I make this exclusively during my daughter’s afternoon naptime. I don’t want to risk any kitchen accidents, so it is safer for her to be asleep in her crib then trying to cook with me. When I make these for holiday gifts I double the recipe to make a large quantity. This way it usually only takes me two afternoon naptimes (2 hours each) to get everything made and put in jars to giveaway. As far as I can tell, there is a hardly a simpler and more efficient way to prepare my Christmas gifts!

To show you just how easy it is to make this amazingly delicious sauce, (and a demonstration on how to eat it with ice-cream!), tune in to Webisode #3. (And, yes, I know there have been a lot of sweets on this site recently, but don’t fret, on Thursday I’m sharing one of my favorite festive dinner recipes!)

The Naptime Chef Peppermint Hot Fudge Sauce from Kelsey Banfield on Vimeo.

I prefer to make homemade Christmas gifts rather than buy them. Sure, I live in New York City, the shopping capital of the world, but giving my friends bags of my Savory and Sweet Spiced Walnuts, jars of Summer Apricot Jam and Peppermint Hot Fudge Sauce simply feels more authentic and heartfelt then gifting something store-bought.

Call me crazy, but I find it fun to spend a few early December afternoons making Christmas gifts while my daughter naps. Then, when she wakes up, we spend evenings assembling gift bags, tying them closed with simple twine and handwritten tags. She is too young to understand the true purpose, but I can tell she already enjoys playing “Santa” and bringing her friends little bags filled with goodies for them to enjoy.

My tendency toward making gifts started at an early age. Growing up in Cooperstown all the families, including mine, spent the entire month of November cooking and baking treats to give away in December. In recent years my friend’s husband dubbed it “The Great Cooperstown Snack Exchange” which is actually the perfect name for it. While replicating this idea in New York City would be totally impossible – can you imagine every resident running around to and fro handing bags of homemade cookies to each other (!) – I still manage to do this with my group of friends. We love getting together to swap goodies and stories, and the kids seem to enjoy it, too.

Despite the fact that I am going to ruin the surprise for my actual friends, I am going to disclose the contents of my gift bags this year post by post. Typically I start thinking about what I am going to be making sometime in October. In fact, this year I jotted down my first Christmas gift bag idea on October 12th to be exact – it is dated in my journal. While mulling over ideas I like to consider goods that will keep well, can be made in large batches and don’t require expensive exotic ingredients. I prefer to make things that are unique, delicious and useful. That is, items that can be used to feed the family or for entertaining.

The first recipe I settled upon this year was my Savory & Sweet Spiced Walnuts. I love the way this recipe yields perfectly crunchy walnuts enveloped in a thin layer of sweet and salty spice. When I give these to my friends I often attach a little note that reads: -Salads -Snacks -Nut Bowls to indicate the variety of ways in which these walnuts can be enjoyed. They are incredibly versatile during the holiday season, there are any number of ways in which they can be used. I am particularly fond of sprinkling them in green salads along with crumbled blue cheese and a sharp vinaigrette.

One of the best parts about this recipe is that it is easy to make while my daughter naps, and the walnuts store very well in plastic bags until they are ready to be packed and given away. In fact, I have found that I can complete three double batches of these during my daughter’s afternoon naptime. Once they are cooled, and my daughter has woken up, I enlist her help scooping the walnuts into clear bags to be tied with twine. This task entertains her to no end and is invaluable to me. Then we place the bags in a deep bag to be stored in our pantry until it is time to make the next Christmas gift in our trio.