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On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me five Chestnut Rings, four Poppyseed cookies, three peppermint macaroons, two orange date cookies and a freshly baked ginger snap I am very proud of these. These are the second cookies of my own that I've come up with in the last couple of months. They didn't come out quite as I had hoped, but they were very tasty none the less. To me, Christmas usually comes with Christmas markets where you, as a rule, must burn your fingers peeling roasted (over-priced) chestnuts from a paper cone. Thanks to Covid, I won't be going to any of those this year, but still wanted to capture that Christmassy flavour in cookies for one of these 12 days of Christmas cookies. Ingredients: 1/2 c butter, softened 3/4 chestnut paste 1 1/4 c brown sugar 3/4 tbsp vanilla extract 3 tbsp milk 1 egg 1 3/4 tsp cinnamon 3/4 tsp baking soda 1 3/4 c flour 1) Cream butter, chestnut and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the wet ingredients and then the dry and mix well. 2) Pipe the dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet in rings and then bake at 190°C for 8 minutes until golden brown. 3) Cool and then enjoy. So very tasty! My husband says he doesn't want to share with anyone. I had hoped that the flavour of roasted chestnuts would come out, but it didn't. Instead there is a gentle sweetness and a delicate chestnut flavour blending with the cinnamon. These are definitely going on the "to make again" list! Thinking of trying another new chestnut variety where the chestnut would have more opportunity to roast rather than being part of the dough... hmmm... we'll see. EDIT: I have now worked out a recipe where these taste more like roast chestnuts. Check it out here!

On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me four poppy seed cookies with red current jam, three peppermint macaroons, two orange date cookies and a freshly baked ginger snap I saw the inspiration for these somewhere but then went my own way with them. We tried them three different ways: open-faced with the jam, as sandwiches with the jam in the middle (the reason I decided to roll the dough out and cut them rather than dropping the dough by teaspoonfuls onto the cookie sheet), and plain. All three were very tasty. I think I left them about 30 seconds too long in the oven, and they were a little crisp rather than soft, but overall, very tasty. I believe the original recipe called for raspberry jam, but I used red currents as that is what I had on hand, and I think that cranberries would work equally well. Ingredients: For the jam: 1 c of red currents (or other berries) 1/3 c sugar For the cookies: 1/2 c butter 1 c sugar 1 egg 1 tbsp milk 1 tsp vanilla extract 1 tsp baking powder 1 1/2 c flour 3 tbsp poppy seeds Zest of 1 lemon 1) Place berries and sugar in a saucepan. Bring to a boil, then simmer stirring regularly until it thickens to form a jam. Taste test and add a little extra sugar if necessary. You don't want this too thick, but if you plan on making sandwiches then you don't want it too thin either. 2)Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the egg, milk and vanilla and mix well. Add the remaining ingredients, and stir to form a dough. 3) On a floured surface, roll out the dough to 1 - 1.5 cm thick, and then cut out rounds (use a smaller cutter than you want the cookies as these will grow). OR (if you don't plan on making sandwiches) 3) drop the dough by teaspoonfuls onto a prepared cookie sheet and then flatten with a knife dipped in cold water. 4) Bake at 190°C for 8 minutes. Allow to cool, then spread with jam. These were a new addition to our Christmas cookie roster but I think they will be staying. We can't agree on how we like these best. Let me know what you think! EDIT: I made these again this year, but used cranberry jam instead of making fresh red currant jam. It worked very nicely!

On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me three peppermint macaroons, two orange date cookies and a freshly baked ginger snap I have never made macarons before, so this was definitely a trial. Also, I followed a recipe... sort of. I saw the idea and the recipe on Tasty, but then altered it slightly to suit my ingredients, and to avoid using too many noisy kitchen utensils after Little Bit's bedtime. Below is what I actually did. They were tasty but came out a little flat. I am not sure if I over- or under-beat my egg whites, but it took me two attempts. The first time, when I added the sugar it went stiff and then increasingly liquidy. So I set it aside (need to figure out what to use that for) and tried again. The second time they were stiff peaks but maybe not quite stiff enough, but I was hesitant to keep going lest I get a syrup again. As a result, I think my batter was a little thin, making piping difficult, and instead of standing up as little blobs, as soon as I dolloped them onto the cookie sheet, my macarons went flat. My macaron work needs some practice, but I will do so and hopefully master macarons in the future! Ingredients: 1 3/4 c powdered sugar 1 c ground almonds 3 egg whites A pinch of salt 1/4 c granulated sugar 2 tsp dried peppermint leaves (or 1 tsp mint extract) 1 c chocolate, smashed up 1/2 c cream 1) Mix the powdered sugar and almonds together. (If you don't have the noise restrictions I did you can blitz them to get them as fine as possible) 2) Brew the mint leaves in 1/2 c of boiling water for at least an hour. Then bring to a boil and add 1 tbsp of the sugar, reducing to form a syrup. 3) In a clean bowl beat egg whites and the pinch of salt to soft peaks. 4) Gradually add the granulated sugar and beat to form stiff peaks. 5) In thirds, fold in the sugar and almond mix until thick and ribonny. With the last third add the mint syrup. 6) Dollop (or pipe, but I don't have a pastry piping set) the batter onto a lined cookie sheet and bang on the counter a couple of times to release air bubbles. Leave to dry 30-60 minutes. 7) Melt the chocolate in a Bain Marie, combining it with the cream until it forms a smooth mass. Let it cool for about an hour. 8) Bake the macaroons at 150°C for 20 minutes then cool on a wire rack. 9) Either dip the individual macaroons in the chocolate or use the chocolate to sandwich two macaroons together ( or, as I did with some of mine that broke, put them in a bowl and drizzle the chocolate over.) These were very tasty but a little too sweet and not nearly minty enough. I would like to try these again, cutting the sugar ( but then I need to find some way to balance out the textural needs) and I need to step up the minty-ness. Very tasty though and a worthy inclusion! If you make them and get them a little taller than mine send me a picture!

And freshly baked ginger snaps This was my first original cookie recipe, all my own rather than just tweaking of an original. It feels a bit like cheating to include it as I posted it so recently, but as we are including it in our Christmas cookies, I am including it here. Ingredients: 1 c butter, softened 1/2 c white sugar 1/2 c dark brown sugar 1/2 c ground almonds 1/3 c pomegranate molasses 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract 2 eggs 1 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp cloves 2 c flour 1/4 c dried orange peel 3/4 c dates, chopped 1) Cream butter and sugar in a bowl. add almonds and pomegranate molasses and mix well. Soak orange peel in a cup of hot water. 2) Stir in wet ingredients, then gradually add dry ingredients. 3) Drain orange peel. Add date and orange peel. Drop onto greased cookie sheet by teaspoonfuls. 4) Bake at 180°C for 8-10 minutes until golden on top. Cool for a few minutes then enjoy warm! I know I had these recently, but it was so nice to have them again. They were such a tasty discovery! Happy Advent!

On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me freshly a baked ginger snap The first of this year's Christmas cookies! Ginger snaps are on of the traditional Christmas cookies that I grew up with. They are quick and easy to assemble, and very tasty! The only caveat is that letting the dough chill before baking is important and so they aren't as good for whim cookies. Ingredients: 2 c flour 2 tsp baking powder 3/4 tsp ginger 1/2 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp cloves 3/4 c butter 1 c sugar + 1/4 c to roll the cookies in after 1 egg 1/4 c molasses 2 tsp grated orange peel (optional 2 tsp dried orange peel bits) 1) Cream butter and sugar together until fluffy. Add the egg and molasses and mix until smooth. Add orange zest and orange peel. 2) Gradually add the dry ingredients (you can sift these together beforehand and then add them, but that is optional), and stir to form cookie dough. Chill for 30 minutes at least. 3) Roll the dough into marble-sized balls and then roll in the remaining 1/4c of sugar. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet with at least double the size of the marbles between the balls of dough - these spread! Bake at 180°C for 10 minutes. I love these! The smell of ginger snaps baking is so reminiscent of Christmas time for me, and of baking as a family growing up, with friends, and now with my own little family. I hope you enjoy them. Stay tuned for the next 11 days of Christmas cookies!

As mentioned in Day 97 of The Challenge Happy Thanksgiving (a little belatedly)! Pumpkin pie is a staple Thanksgiving and Christmas food in my family, so even though we were unable to do a full Thanksgiving dinner on the day, we had a pie. This year though I decided to do it with a twist. For starters there is a discussion every year between my husband and I about whether we are making his family's pie or mine. They are both good. They both have definite merits, but we each favour the one we grew up with. So this year, I made a hybrid, not either properly speaking but somewhere between the two. Then, I decided that as pumpkin pie is always homogenous in texture and has quite a smooth, low note to it, I wanted to sharpen it a little with swirly of rosehip puree through it. Finally, my sister had suggested trying to change up the crust a little, using some juice or something to change the colour, so I made pomegranate and cinnamon crust. The pink colour was more striking in the raw dough, but it had a very nice flavour and played well with the rest of the flavours. Ingredients: For the crust: 1 1/2 - 2 c flour 3/4 c butter 1/3 - 1/2 c pomegranate juice 1/4 - 1/2 c milk 1 tbsp sugar 1/2 tsp cinnamon For the filling: 1 3/4 c pumpkin purée (I roasted a small pumpkin and mashed it up, skin and all - but no seeds or guts - to get the purée. Leaving the skin ultimately added some texture to the pie) 1 1/2 c evaporated milk 2 eggs 1/4 c brown sugar 1/2 c sugar 1 tsp (heaped) cinnamon 1 tsp ginger 1/4 tsp cloves A pinch of nutmeg 1 1/2 tsp orange peel 1/2 - 3/4 c rosehip purée 1) Place 1 1/2 c flour in a large bowl. Cut butter into it in small pieces and then rub the flour and butter together with finger tips until it forms a crumb like consistency. 2) Pour in the pomegranate juice and stir with a fork to form a dough. Add the sugar and cinnamon, and then as much milk as needed to bring the dough together. 3) Knead on a floured surface for a few minutes, using some of the remaining flour as necessary if the dough is too sticky. The dough should be elastic and not too heavy. Wrap in cling film and chill for at least 30 minutes, if not longer (it still works if you don't chill it, just not as well). 4) Place the pumpkin purée in a mixing bowl. Add all the other ingredients except the rosehip purée, and mix well. 5) Roll out the pie crust and line the bottom of a pie plate with it ( deeper would be better, but as seen in the pictures mine was shallow and it worked very nicely). 6) Pour pumpkin mix into the pie plate. Dollop a spoonful of the rosehips into the centre, and using the blade of a knife or a thin spatula, swirl the rosehip gradually out from the centre to form tendrils of rosehip through the pumpkin, yet with each remaining quite distinct. Repeat this several times until all the rosehip is swirled in, being careful not to scrape up the pie crust with the knife. 7) Bake at 220°C for 15 minutes the lower the oven temperature to 180°C and bake for a further 45-50 minutes. Cool well before serving. I loved this pie and thought it to be a huge success! My husband declared it to be his favourite iteration of pumpkin pie yet. This is the first pumpkin pie we have had that is better without whipped cream! The sweet pie with its deep note contrasted beautifully with the tart note of the rosehips and the sweet acidity of the orange peel against the spices. I liked this new trial crust as well, although I admit to spilling the sugar a bit so it was a bit sweet. The texture was a bit less homogenous due to the orange peel and the pumpkin peel, and to the veins of rosehip running through the pie at different levels. Love love love this pie! Please try it and let me know what you think! EDIT: I made this pie again for Thanksgiving this year. It was as big of a hit as last year, but this time I made it using cranberry juice in the crust instead, which works just as well!

Challenge update: We have reached day 100! I am calling the challenge here as I am no longer always sure what we have or haven't done on the challenge and it is making meal planning more complicated than I have the energy for just now. Also, I feel the 100 is a decent, nice round number. It is now end of November and we have officially not had the same main meal twice since mid-August. To round off this challenge, we had an old favourite that I grew up with, a Turkish meal called Imam Bayildi. Another old favourite was Bacon and lentil soup, which is dead simple but oh! so satisfying. We tried a new twist on porridge, adding persimmons to it, and trialled cauliflower steaks for the first time. I have been meaning to try these for years and am so glad that we did! American Thanksgiving fell on Day 97 of the Challenge, and while we didn't do a full Thanksgiving dinner (not living in the US we need to find another time for it), but I did try a new twist on Pumpkin pie, swirling rosehip purée through it. Another very tasty meal was beetroot pasta with broccoli sauce topped with garlic shrimp. And then finally, for Day 100, we had a roast for dinner, and I tried a new stuffing, Fenugreek Orange Stuffing, that I had the idea for ages ago and have wanted to try for a couple of months. So very tasty and a good way to round off the challenge.

As mentioned in Day 96 of The Challenge Persimmons are a new fruit for me. They are in season around now every year, and I just never picked any up until now. They are wonderful! Delicately sweet and fragrant they are tasty on their own, but they also pair nicely in sweet or savoury dishes. For this one I tried a new tweak to our morning porridge and it was a big hit with all of us! Ingredients: 1 persimmon, chopped 1/2-1 tbsp honey 1 tbsp lime /lemon juice 1 c oats 2 c milk 2 tsp dried coconut 1 tsp vanilla 1 tsp Aloha Spiced Cacao (or cinnamon/pumpkin pie spices) A handful of raisins 1) place persimmons in an oven proof dish or on a cookie sheet. Drizzle with honey and pour lime juice over the top. Roast at 180°C for 15-20 minutes. 2) Cook oats, milk, raisins and coconut in a saucepan at medium heat stirring intermittently and then consistently until they form a porridge. Portion the porridge into 2 bowls and top with the persimmons. Sprinkle with cocoa spice or other spice topping of your choice. We love this! We've tried a number of variations, including adding 1 tsp of vanilla extract to the porridge, with fenugreek seeds roasted with the persimmons, swapping out the lime or lemon juice, adding a drizzle of cream etc. It requires NO further sugar at the coconut, the persimmons and the honey make it quite sweet enough.

As mentioned in Day 87 of The Challenge Butternut and chestnut seasons intersect! This was entirely experimental. I saw the title of this recipe elsewhere but didn't look at the recipe and then couldn't remember where I had seen it, so I made it up. I had no idea how this would turn out, but it was beautiful. The balance of sweet to acid with a little spice went very nicely. Ingredients: 1 butternut squash, halved and with the seeds scooped out 500g chestnuts, parboiled and peeled 3-4 tbsp olive oil 2-4 onions chopped 1 apple, chopped 1-2 tbsp apple cider vinegar 1 tsp sumac 1/8-1/4 nutmeg 1/4 tsp cloves 1-1 1/2 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp fenugreek seeds 2-3 c chicken broth 1/3 -1/2 c cream 2 tsp thyme Salt and pepper to taste Toasted pumpkin seeds to top 1) Place butternut, chestnuts, apple in a heavy skillet or a roasting pan ( I used my cast iron skillet) and drizzle with 2-3 tbsp of olive oil and the apple cider vinegar to achieve good coverage. Sprinkle the sumac, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon and fenugreek seeds over it all and roast for 45 min-1 hour, until the butternut is tender. 2) Sauté onions in the remaining olive oil in the bottom of your soup pot until translucent and even a little charred. Add the contents of the skillet and mix it up ( the butternut should break up easily. Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil, then simmer for 10 minutes, allowing the flavours to meld. 3) Blitz until smooth, then taste test, adjusting any of the spicing or the vinegar. Salt and pepper to taste, and add cream to your taste too. I do recommend some, but how much you do is up to you. Serve and sprinkle with thyme and pumpkin seeds. I absolutely loved this and I am so glad I tried it! The roasting at the start lengthened the cook time a little, but then pulling the soup bit together went really quickly, so it's six and two threes really compared to other souping. The truly lengthy bit is peeling the chestnuts if you use fresh ones, but then I find it quite zen to settle into a task like that. The other option is to use frozen ones that come pre-peeled. In any case, this soup hit all the right notes for me (and hubby and Little Bit) and I hope it does for you too.

As mentioned in Day 80 of The Challenge Quinces are something that (aside from being seasonal! I know! So many seasonal fruits and vegetables in the autumn!) I had only really encountered in jelly or in preserves until recently. And then a couple of years ago a colleague came to work with a bucket of quinces from her garden for anyone to help themselves, and so I started playing around with them. They are like fuzzy green stones, pear-shaped wannabes when they are raw. They need a bit of cooking, usually boiling (I tried roasting one and it sort of worked) to make them edible. This is the first (or one of the first) savoury things I tried with them. As with so many other recipes, it is one I had seen the title of but then lost the recipe link before reading it, so I made it up. Ingredients: 2 onions, chopped 1 tbsp olive oil 600g of carrots, chopped 1 large quince, chopped 1 tbsp honey 2 tsp sumac 1 tsp garam masala 1 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp cloves Salt and pepper to taste Herbs de Provence 1) In a soup pot, sauté onions in the olive oil until translucent. Add carrots and quince and enough water to cover it all. Add spices and honey. Simmer for 45 min or until carrots and quince are tender. 2) Blitz until smooth (or almost. Quince won't go silky smooth like some other vegetables). Taste test and salt and pepper to taste. Serve with garlic and thyme croutons. This was very tasty but my husband said he found it too earthy and sweet. Adding the herbs at the end brightened it all up though and brought the flavours into alignment. Some lemon juice might also work. Let me know what you think!