Favorite Winter Recipes

I love winter food. It's so good, and it makes me feel warm and happy inside. Something about eating hearty, warm meals and sipping hot beverages makes me feel at peace with the world. At least for one night. So I decided to share the love. Here are a few of my favorite things to make in winter. I highly recommend you try them, as you won't be disappointed.

Spiced Cider (Non-Alcoholic)

Really, there are few things so satisfying to me as a hot cup of spiced cider on a cold, snowy afternoon.

1 bottle apple cider or unfiltered apple juice (I like the Gravenstein kind from Trader Joe's)

1 cinnamon stick

3 to 5 cloves (depending on how much you like them--I usually go for four)

1/2 a nutmeg seed

3 to 5 allspice seeds (again, depending on how spicy you want this to be)

Put everything in a pot, and bring to a boil. Turn heat under the pot to low, and let steep for as long as you'd like (just remember to eventually take it off the flame). And it continues to steep, even without heat--it just gets better and better as the days go by. Not that you'll have it for more than two or three.

Nut Crescent Cookies

When I baked Christmas cookies for friends and family this year, I made these babies, along with some lemon sugar cookies. Everybody agreed that the nut crescents stole the show. They are almost pure butter and pecan, and really, what could be better? These are from Cook's Illustrated, a magazine that is usually spot-on in the baking department.

2 cups whole pecans, chopped fine
2 cups bleached all-purpose flour
¾ teaspoon salt
½ lb. (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
½ cup superfine sugar
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1 ½ cups confectioners’ sugar for rolling cooled cookies

1. Adjust oven racks to upper- and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 325 degrees. Mix 1 cup chopped nuts, flour, and salt in medium bowl; set aside. In workbowl of a food processor fitted with a steel blade, process remaining chopped nuts until the texture of course cornmeal, 10 to 15 seconds (do not overprocess; you should have about ¾ cup ground nuts); stir into flour mixture and set aside. (To finely grind chopped nuts by hand, roll them between two large sheets of plastic wrap with rolling pin, applying moderate pressure, until broken down to course cornmeal-like texture).
2. Either by hand or with electric mixer, cream butter and sugar until light and creamy, about 1 ½ minutes with mixer set at medium; beat in vanilla. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl with spatula; add flour mixture and beat at low speed until dough just begins to come together but still looks scrappy, about 15 seconds. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl again; continue beating at low speed until dough is cohesive, 6 to 9 seconds longer. Do not overbeat.
3. Working with about 1 tablespoon dough at a time, roll dough into 1 ¼-inch balls. Roll each ball between hands into rope that measures 3 ½ inches long. Shape ropes into crescents on ungreased cookie sheets, spacing them 1 to 1 ½ inches apart.
4. Bake, reversing position of cookie sheets (from top rack to bottom and front to back) halfway through baking, until tops are pale golden and bottoms are just beginning to brown, 17 to 19 minutes. Cool cookies on sheets about 2 minutes before transferring them to a cooling rack.
5. Cool cookies to room temperature, about 30 minutes. Working with three or four cookies at a time, roll cookies in confectioners’ sugar to coat them thoroughly. Gently shake off excess. (They can be stored in an airtight container up to 5 days.)