Holiday Baking.......

For the last 2 weeks,I've been knee deep in Holiday Baking. I decided once again to sell my baking and I was inundated with orders.

Yesterday, Robin and I made 2 items to give away as gifts. First up, we made a huge batch of caramel popcorn. I tested this recipe a couple weeks ago with microwave popcorn and it was good. I thought however, that it would be cheaper to make if we bought raw popcorn and popped it ourselves. Robin popped two kinds ( white and yellow) and we decided we liked the white better. I got the recipe for caramel popcorn over at Egullet. Jaymes has a recipe over on the thread that everyone is using and raving about. Its a pretty simple recipe using butter, brown sugar, corn syrup, salt, mollases, vanilla and baking soda. We added pecans, peanuts and almonds.

In this area, bits and bites are another popular holidaym item. Most people use a Canadian cereal called Shreddies. I like to shake things up and be different( plus I had a 1 dollar off coupon for crispix cereal that I bought in MI). I also added cherrios, almonds and another item not sold in Ontario, Oyster crackers. This was mixed with melted butter and a large amount of Penzey's Rocky Mountain Dip Mix. I added more parmesean, worsteshire, a squirt of lemon juice, garlic powder, smoked salt, more sesame and poppy seeds. This whole mess was baked for a good hour( tossing a few times) at 250F. When it cooled down, we added Rold Gold Pretzel sticks, cheetos and 2 bags of bbq kettle cooked peanuts( bought at Big Lots for 1.00 each). This blend is absolutely addicting!!

Next up, tons of cookies.......