{"id":9719,"date":"2022-12-20T10:45:35","date_gmt":"2022-12-20T15:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/?p=9719"},"modified":"2022-12-20T10:45:35","modified_gmt":"2022-12-20T15:45:35","slug":"to-reduce-the-christmas-stress-im-starting-early-baking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/2022\/12\/20\/to-reduce-the-christmas-stress-im-starting-early-baking\/","title":{"rendered":"To reduce the Christmas stress, I’m starting early baking"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fortunately, the weather has been subzero and still snowing, so we spend more time indoors lately. My son, Bill, and his family have been without power for nearly four days, while he’s been sick with COVID. (Yes, he’s vaccinated and boostered.) Luckily, he was only really sick for two days and grandson, Mason, was a big help, getting the generator up and running so they could power the fridge, freezer, and LP fireplace fan. They came through the outage quite well but I’m sure they were happy to get the power back on.<\/p>\n

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The last snow we got is still here, with six more inches and subzero temperatures on the way.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The wet, heavy snow is only an inconvenience for us but has caused big power outages, buildings to collapse, and trees to block roadways.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of our favorite holiday foods is a fruitcake I try to make every year. My friend Jeri gave me the recipe years ago and Will swears by it, saying it tastes like the one his grandma used to make. It’s quite a different fruitcake, in that you make it in a 9×12-inch cake pan, then cut it into bars after it has been turned out to cool. I’ll give you the recipe so you can give it a try if you’d like. Here it is:<\/p>\n

2 bags of mixed candied fruit peels
\n2 cups nuts, coarsely chopped
\n1 cup golden raisins
\n6 eggs
\n\u00bc cup orange juice (I used Tang drink, mixed)
\n1 tsp. vanilla
\n2 cups flour
\n2 cups sugar
\n1 tsp. baking powder
\n1 tsp. salt<\/p>\n

Preheat your oven to 250 degrees F. Lightly grease or spray a cake pan, then lay waxed paper in it so it is long enough to hang out both ends and go up the sides as far as possible. In a large mixing bowl (I use my stand mixer bowl, in the mixer), beat eggs, orange juice, and vanilla. Gently add the sugar, then mix in the flour, baking powder, salt, and the rest of the ingredients. Mix very well. Then, pour out into your cake pan, making sure the waxed paper remains in place. Bake for 2 or more hours until just firm. Take from oven and cool for about half an hour. Put a cookie sheet on top of pan and flip it over so the fruitcake drops out onto the cookie pan. Cool completely, then cut into bars the width you desire. Individually wrapped in aluminum foil or plastic wrap, they remain good for weeks and make great small gifts. (I always buy my candied fruit peels and other specialized holiday baking supplies after Christmas. I get them very <\/em>cheap then!)<\/p>\n

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We can’t wait for the World’s Best Fruitcake to cool enough to eat!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By the way, let me share a way we save lots of money and have some great meals without resorting to the same-old leftovers. I buy half of a boneless pork loin (a bigger family might want a whole one). This, I roast in the oven, along with potatoes, onions, and carrots. This gives us the first nice meal, with some nice pork gravy over the potatoes. The second meal, I thinly slice some of the roasted loin then pull it apart and simmer with barbecue sauce. Served on a bun with some fried potatoes alongside, we have a happy second meal. The third meal is sliced, cold pork loin with a cheese slice, served on the remaining buns (homemade are best!), with a bit of mayonnaise and a sprinkle of honey-mesquite rub over the meat. The fourth meal is diced pork, sliced carrots, diced potatoes, peas, onions, and a can of cream of mushroom soup + \u00bd a can of milk, mixed and put into a pie crust, with a vented top crust placed over it. This makes a fabulous pork pie! If you’re lucky, you have just a little of that loin left over which you can dice finely and add to an omelet with veggies and cheese, making another great, filling meal. My half pork loin cost $7.89, on sale, so you can see how cheaply you can eat really good meals from only one piece of meat. Yup, I’m cheap and proud of it! — Jackie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fortunately, the weather has been subzero and still snowing, so we spend more time indoors lately. My son, Bill, and his family have been without power for nearly four days, while he’s been sick with COVID. (Yes, he’s vaccinated and boostered.) Luckily, he was only really sick for two days and grandson, Mason, was a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9721,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,24,10,11,13,17,18],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9719"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9719"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9719\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9723,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9719\/revisions\/9723"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}