Posts tagged as:

Christmas cookies

A Cookie Bake and Chobani Giveaway

by Eating Bird Food on December 19, 2011

One of my favorite childhood memories of Christmas, besides decorating the tree while listening to Alvin and Chipmunks Christmas album, is baking cookies with my mom and sister. Now that my sister and I don’t live at home, we try to pick a weekend each year for all the girls to together for the annual cookie bake.

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Everyone was able to make it this year including my mom, nanny, sister and two nieces. Even Olive, the youngest lady of the group, was there to help out. :)

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We made four different types of cookies, two types of bars and peanut butter fudge – all before 2 PM. It was a blast!! I was too busy baking and didn’t get a photo of everything, but I managed to snap a few…

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Of course, Nanny’s Crescent Cookies were part of the line-up. They’re a family favorite!

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Autumn (my youngest niece) made these cute snowflake sugar cookies, which were a hit with everyone.

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This year I decided to try a new recipe for Vanilla Almond Cookies.

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The cookies are made with Chobani’s non-fat vanilla Greek yogurt, relatively low in calories and have a nice almond flavor. I’m not sure if I made a mistake or if the cookies are supposed to be this way, but they’re pretty dense and cakey. Everyone seemed to like them, but the cake-like consistency wasn’t my fav.

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Speaking of Chobani, they just recently “decked the dairy halls” (and my house) with new 32oz holiday containers of their Plain 0%, Vanilla 0% and Plain 2% Greek yogurt, which are perfect for holiday cooking and baking. The best part (besides more Cho) is that the containers even have recipe ideas on them including Pumpkin Mini Tarts, Cornbread and Cranberry Orange Bread. Love that!

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Chobani sent me one container of all three 32oz flavors to try out and they’re offering the same package to one lucky EBF reader. Happy Holidays from Chobani (and me!)

Simply leave a comment on this post with your favorite Chobani flavor or favorite recipe that uses Greek yogurt to enter. The giveaway will close on Wednesday, December 21 at 11:59PM EST and I’ll announce the winner soon thereafter. (This giveaway is open to Canadian readers, but please know that they can only offer the 0% Plain and the container will not have a recipe on the packaging because Chobani JUST hit Canada!)

**UPDATE: The winner of the giveaway is:

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Katherine, please shot me an email (eatingbirdfood at gmail dot com) and your Chobani will be on it’s way!

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Happy Happy Hanukkah!!

by Eating Bird Food on December 12, 2009

Yesterday evening I kicked off the first night of Hanukkah with Isaac and his family at a friend of the families home.

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We started the evening with a glass of wine and the lighting of the menorahs.

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There were enough menorahs for everyone to light one.

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Quite the Festival of Lights!

It was also Shabbat so we enjoyed some delicious, locally baked challah from Montana Gold Bread.

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Dinner was delicious. It started with a spinach, mandarin oranges, walnuts, and dried cranberries with a raspberry vinaigrette dressing.

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Potato latkes, of course!

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Baked salmon, which was cooked to perfection!

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Roasted root vegetables we my contribution to the meal- I used this recipe.

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Here’s my plate. My potato latke was topped with apple sauce.

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We came back to our place and opened presents with Isaac’s family! Twas a fun filled evening.

Wishing a Happy Hanukkah to everyone who celebrates!! The best part is that Isaac and I celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas so we still have this to look forward to:

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As an update, Isaac and I decided to stay in to celebrate our anniversary a few nights ago. Cline 2008 Ancient Vines Zinfandel and homemade butternut squash ravioli made the night a success.

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I was sent some coupons for Nasoya won-ton wraps and I had been saving them for a special meal- they ended up making the homemade ravioli super easy. I used this video post for inspiration.

For the butternut squash filling I used:

1 cup canned organic butternut squash
1/4 cup Tofutti Better n’ Cream Cheese
1/4 cup grated Parmesan Cheese
1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp sea salt and ground black pepper
a pinch of cayenne pepper

Directions- Mix the above ingredients together in a bowl and place a teaspoon of filling into the middle of each round won-ton wrapper. Wet the edges of the wrap and folded it to make a half moon shape. Boil water and cook the raviolis for 2-3 minutes.
While the raviolis cook, heat about 1- 4 tablespoons butter, sage, parsley, sea salt, ground pepper and pine nuts on the stove. Top the plated raviolis with the butter sauce and serve.
I served the ravioli with broccoli and the meal turned out to be quite delicious. Perfect for our special night!
I also received some beautiful flowers from Isaac, which made me smile from ear to ear.

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I hope everyone is having a lovely weekend. Today I’ve been enjoying the annual Christmas cookie bake that my mom, sister, and nieces do every year! It’s been so fun spending a day in the kitchen with my girls! Tomorrow I’m off to a graduation party and then headed to my holiday work party later. Busy little weekend.

I’ll be back with an update on the delicious cookies we’ve been baking today- here’s a little teaser.

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Do you have annual pre- Christmas traditions? Do they involve food?

- Brittany

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