Tonight we are taking down our tree. Three days into 2012, I'm ready for all vestiges of Christmas decorations to be gone so that I can focus on all that I can accomplish in the new year.
One thing I can accomplish? Telling you more about what I cooked for Christmas, mostly as gifts.
We still have a couple of Christmas Wreaths left, so we'll have to make them disappear soon, too. I thought these cookies looked incredibly fun when I saw them. They'll be perfect gifts! Since I ship my edible gifts, I am constantly on the lookout for recipes that travel well, and these seemed to fit the bill.
I recruited Alex to help me make these because the recipe involved quickly molding gooey marshmallow-laden cornflakes into wreath shapes. Time was of the essence. Aside from that urgency, the recipe was really pretty simple to make. You melt butter in a saucepan, add (large, not mini-) marshmallows, and melt until smooth. Add vanilla and green food coloring. Add cornflakes and mix well.
At this point I suppose you could pour the mixture into a greased pan and just have some festive looking cornflake treats, but instead I put the pan in a larger pot with a few inches of hot water in it to help keep the marshmallows from cooling. I spooned the cornflake mixture onto waxed paper, while Alex shaped it into wreath shapes. We decided we wanted M&Ms instead of Red Hots for our holly berries, since we like M&Ms. I actually made mine a little too small because I wanted to be sure I made enough. If you're not worried about quantity, I say make them bigger! The bigger ones stayed together better.
Since I used mini-marshmallows, the cookies didn't harden too well, so I cut the waxed paper into squares and sent the wreaths off still attached to the paper. This helped me stack them in the containers. (I hope they made it intact!)
These were tasty - just like rice krispie treats with cornflakes instead. I liked how festive they were. The cornflakes did soften after a few weeks, but overall I think they held up pretty well. These may make it into my Christmas reporetoire of cooking and baking.
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