I’ve wanted to do something about Christmas for years, and have simply never had the guts to do it…and this year is no exception. But I have a plan, and maybe….I’ll do it next year….maybe.
I’ve written earlier about my revulsion to the whole commercial scene around Christmas. I hate seeing tinsel and Santa Claus in October. I hate hearing canned Christmas schmaltz every time I have to make a transaction on the phone and I’m put on hold. I can’t imagine even venturing out of my house on Black Friday for all the “deals”.
My way of dealing with my dislike of all this in recent years has been to try to make as many gifts as I can. I knit (and this year, I’m way behind, some of the gifts will be for Epiphany, Groundhog Day and even Valentine’s Day). I make candy and pesto. This year Heidi and I are planning to make up a recipe for Shaker Convenience Mix, and put it in jars with recipes included for biscuits or pancakes or cookies. I learned to bead this year, and that is fun. We put up our tree around Dec 20th and leave it up until Twelfth Night…decorations for the gates and door are a little earlier. I haven’t been to a mall in years, my savior being the Internet. Things bought, wrapped, packaged and sent with a gift card. “Not very personal”, my inner I’ve Bought Into The System says, but really what’s so personal about driving to a crowded mall, not really knowing if the giver will love it or hate it, getting frustrated, tired and discouraged? One has to keep in mind that apparently the busiest days of the year after Christmas for stores are the hordes of people returning gifts they don’t want, or worse yet, forcing the giver to return them.
I love the season of Advent…the four Sundays before Christmas. I usually have an Advent wreath on the kitchen table. It has four candles on it….three purple and one rose, and a grand gold pillar in the middle. The third Sunday of Advent is the rose one…a little break in the mildly penitential season of Advent represented by purple. On Christmas Eve the big pillar is lighted and white candles substituted for the purple and rose ones. Advent is the season of waiting, of preparing. I have a friend who grew up with the tradition of thoroughly cleaning your house to prepare for the baby Jesus. What a lovely idea, instead of preparing it for a large flat-screen TV. I take my friend Ed out to Wilson Farms to get greens for the church and get supplies of a wreath and some candles for myself. I bake, and so do Rudy and Heidi….cookies, coffee bread, Weihnachtstollen. Back in the day when I was performing a lot, there were lots of concerts between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I loved singing in them.
On Christmas Eve, I go to church in the morning to help with the flowers and greenery, then in the early evening Heidi and I go to choir rehearsal bearing our contributions to the feast which follows the evening service. Rudy (and this year, our grandson Alex) arrive in time for the service. The music is special and wonderful, the service beautiful with candles and greenery and incense and hope, and the feast amazing. The next day in the late afternoon, we have a dinner party at home with relatives and friends. We open presents throughout the day, but frankly, this is the part I could do without. Not because I am cheap, either, but because every family has its most dysfunctional time around the issue of what was given and received at Christmas pasts, and the memories are usually not pleasant.
So here is my plan for next year, if I’m not too chicken to actually do it:
We will give presents on Epiphany. We will really celebrate the Twelve Days of Christmas.
I’ll do Advent in force. I’ll knit and bead and bake and light candles. I’ll make tree ornaments and wreaths, put out the little carolers on the table in the hall. I’ll bake for church and make special breakfast stuff for Christmas morning. I’ll help with flowers at church and sing and enjoy the feast. Then I will go home to bed, and on Christmas morning we’ll have a grand special breakfast. We will then head out to a tree lot and pick out the largest tree…for free… and put it up and decorate it. If we’re invited somewhere for dinner, good, if not, I’ll roast a chicken. On Boxing Day, or a day or so later we’ll head out to get some fancy ornaments for almost nothing, and to find presents and ribbon for a considerable saving. (I’ve started wrapping stuff in pretty fabric, saves trees and cuts way down on the amount of stuff I have to carry out to the barn in the cold for the rubbish people). On Epiphany, or the closest Sunday to it, I’ll invite everyone for a wonderful dinner party. It makes Christmas into a religious holiday, and the gift-giving comes with the Three Kings. Or if you’re not into religious traditions, I’d bet that it would be a LOT less expensive and a lot less pressurized.
Anyone want to take the pledge and join me?
Meanwhile, here are two recipes:
Shaker Convenience Mix (from Best of Shaker Cooking by Amy Bess Miller and Persis Fuller)
9C sifted flour
1 TBS salt
1/3C baking powder
1 1/2-2C shortening
Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl. Cut in the shortening as for pastry. When thoroughly blended store in a canister or glass jar in the refrigerator. It should keep for two months, but check to be on the safe side.
BISCUITS: 2c mix, 1 large egg, ½ C milk, cream or sour cream. Mix together, form into biscuits and bake @400⁰ for 12-15 minutes
MUFFINS: 3C mix, 1 large egg, ¼ C sugar, 1 C milk. Mix together and spoon into buttered muffin tins. Bake @425⁰ for 20 minutes. You can add berries, or fruit or extra sugar if you like. 1 ½ C cranberries are good too. Stir, not beat the batter. For Jam Muffins, after 10 minutes put 1 tsp jam on to center of each muffin and finish baking.
PANCAKES: 1 ½ C mix, 1 TBS sugar, ½ C milk, 2 large eggs. Apples or blueberries are nice too.
WEIHNACHTSTOLLEN
This is a Struss/Schild Christmas tradition. I got the recipe from an old out-of-print cookbook called Luchow’s, which was a German restaurant in NYC, and made the first batch in 1960, when Morgan was a very tiny baby. Ever since, I make it every year. I usually make it the night before Christmas Eve, since I sing on Christmas Eve. I let the loaves cool, frost them, then wrap them in plastic wrap with pretty ribbons.
11c sifted flour
2c milk
1 ¼ c melted butter (2 ½ sticks) I use unsalted butter.
6 eggs
1c sugar
2 oz yeast, proofed (put dry yeast in 1/2c warm water with a little sugar, let rise a little)
½ tsp salt, more if using unsalted butter (maybe 1 tsp)
½ tsp grated nutmeg
½ tsp mace
1 TBS cognac
1 TBS grated lemon peel
Get a huge bowl and put in flour. Make a hole in the middle and add the other ingredients. Mix as much as you can (start with a spoon, and then use your hands). Turn out on to a floured surface and knead. Then add one at a time, and kneading after each addition:
1 lb seedless raisins
1 lb currants
¼ blanched almonds, chopped
½ c citron
(I also add dried cranberries, or other dried fruit, and sometimes walnut pieces. If, like my daughter, Sylvia, you hate citron, you could leave it out and use other dried chopped fruits)
Clean and grease the bowl, put the dough back in it, cover with a towel and let rise in a warm place for some hours, until doubled in size. Punch down, form into loaves like this: Form 3 large balls, and roll or pat them until they are about 2 inches thick and flat. Then fold one side over the other and put on greased baking sheets. Let rise again, until doubled. Don’t let this go on for hours, or you will have huge, unwieldy, odd-tasting loaves.
Bake at 350 for one hour.
TOPPING
¼ c melted butter (1/2 stick)
2 TBS cognac
½ c confectioner’s sugar
