Make the holiday season sweeter with delectable Christmas food gifts from your kitchen. From flavoured vinegars and homemade liqueurs to fruitcakes and cookies, there's something for everyone.
You can never have too many festive food gifts on hand during the holiday season. You can bring them to parties as hostess gifts, or give them to friends or neighbours who stop by unexpectedly. When you don't quite know what to give to kind co-workers or talented teachers, give the gift of food. Everyone's got to eat!
There are many recipe sites online with heaps of great free recipes. The one I refer to most is Taste, which is an Australian website with over 20,000 recipes. It is super easy to navigate too.
Here are a couple of ideas I like…
‘Cookies in a jar’
For great recipes like this one click here.
These are the easiest puddings you’ll ever make.
Gosh, how many batches of chocolate royal puddings have I made for my kids school functions over the years? They still love them and if I made a batch now they’d disappear in seconds. Especially good for me, as I have a child who doesn’t eat any type of cake... I know, how crazy is that? Who doesn’t eat cake!!! Here’s the recipe.
I also make this – White Chocolate bark. Click here for recipe.
This looks great packaged up in cello bags and fancy ribbon.
Perhaps what I am known best for at Christmas, is my truffles. I make them all year round but ALWAYS make several batches for the holidays. I serve them to guests, give them as gifts to neighbours and often pop some in a small cello bag to give to people when I visit their homes at Christmas.
Here are my tips for making truffles:
· Make sure your balls are all a uniform size.
· I find truffles freeze really well. I spend an afternoon making up several different batches and then freeze in smaller lots, often combining a mixture of different truffles in the same snap lock bag. They are great when you get those phone calls announcing the eminent arrival of unexpected guests. Simply grab a bag from the freezer, plate up and being small they will defrost in no time.
· If making fresh, you can make truffles up to a week earlier and store in an airtight container in the fridge. Roll in coatings up to one day ahead.
Click here for 60+ truffle recipes.
I love decorating truffles and have as much fun making them as I do eating them!
Here’s some more inspiration...
Christmas truffle trees. Attach truffles to foam cone using toothpicks.
Dip in white chocolate and then crushed candy canes for a festive look...yummo!!
What about Red-Nosed Rudolph Truffles.
Here’s how: Frost a cupcake generously with white icing. Roll truffle in cocoa powder. Flatten the truffle slightly. Use more frosting to make eyes, and a red M&M to make nose. Stick the truffle on the cupcake, and use chocolate leaves to make the antlers. Never made chocolate leaves? Super easy, wash and dry leaves from your garden and paint the back of leaves with melted chocolate and a paint brush (I keep a small paint brush just for chocolate making in my utensil draw). Allow chocolate to dry and then gently peel off the leaf. These also look lovely added to the top of a chocolate cake.
So there you go... a few ideas for kitchen gifts. I’d love to hear your suggestions.
Also, if you pop back on Wednesday, Jordan from Polka Dot Prints has a great guest post tutorial for making gorgeous packaging for your foodie gifts.
And in keeping with the handmade food theme this week, the Friday Giveaway for my followers this week is this cute 8” x 10” pudding canvas painted by yours truly!
Just a reminder… on Friday I will be running a blog linky party ‘Show us your Christmas home’. I hope you will all join in by sharing photos of your Christmas home decorating in a blog post. I can’t wait to see all your festive inspiration. Check in with ‘Simply Christmas’ on Friday to add your link.
Until then, I’ll be in the kitchen baking.
Hugs ~ Kerryanne