Delayed Holiday Baking: Where's the Color?

After reading some postings on other blogs on how excited people are when starting their holiday baking session, I said to myself that I wanted to distribute my home-baked goods to my friends and relatives. Sadly, that opportunity to have time and permission (yes, permission!) to bake only arrived when I finally got the courage to break the rules and bake anyway. My father, who at that time was staying with the rest of my family for the holiday couldn't stand the wonderful smell of anything baking in the oven. No, the exhauster, open-window, and open-door would not make up for the fresh air. However, I was determined to do some baking because I just want to spread the goodness of my freshly baked cookies and quick breads.

So, I started of with the delicate nastars (pineapple cookies I mentioned before). This is the cookie I spent time the most. Making the outer crust, shaping the crust dough into small balls, shaping the pineapple jam filling into even smaller balls, flattening the balled crusts to be filled with the pineapple jam, then shaping them into round balls. Finally, brushing their tops with eggwash and baking them in an oven for 30 minutes. These steps combined took me around 3 hours (when I'm doing it alone as I always do). These steps haven't included the making of homemade pineapple jam which could take up to 3 hours as well! Making this cookie is a lot of work, but well worth it.


Next, I moved into making a loaf of Crunchy Sour Cream Banana Bread. Very easy to make, with satisfying result. This quickbread is almost fully sweetened with the over-ripe bananas I stored in the fridge since a week ago. The moistness is enhanced with the addition of sourcream. And finally, adding walnut pieces as the final touch made this bread a perfect companion for a morning or afternoon tea (for those of you who get when sun's above your heads). I made this bread for my mom, just to grant her request.


Another request from my mom was this lovely and fragrant almond orange biscotti (its original name from its original recipe was "biscotti toscani". Again, very easy to make but can be very tricky. I've baked biscotti twice this holiday season and both of them cracked on the top. Argh! This made it very hard when cutting. Also, during the first round of baking my biscotti wouldn't harden as it should be after going into the oven the second time. However, it did harden up during the second round of baking. The ones I packed into a tin jar for my mom to take home.


In the end, I did some baking for the holiday. But, aren't they supposed to be colorful to signify the joy of the season? Well, that's the questions to myself, why wasn't I creative enough to add some decorations? Perhaps because I was preoccupied by the presence of my family, in which we had such wonderful time together.