‘Tis the season for recipe making, tasting, and swapping! We’re whipping out our slow cookers and checking our grocery lists twice as we prepare for parties and dinners this season. It occurs to us that we have shared quite a lot of recipes with you guys, so we thought we should compile them in one place and feature a few favorites.
Lifeway Women’s Go-To Christmas Recipes
There are SO MANY great recipes featured in last year’s guide to our go-to recipes. Find sweet treats like fudge pie, apple crisp, and toffee plus savory selections like corn casserole, tuna dip, and lasagna. I highly recommend you download + print of all the recipe cards because they are so stinkin’ cute. Just click here. An office favorite is the following Strawberry Pretzel Salad. A couple of girls make it, and it’s always a hit!
Strawberry Pretzel Salad
¾ cup margarine
2 cups crushed pretzels
8 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature
1 cup sugar
2 cups Cool Whip, refrigerated, not frozen
6 ounces strawberry Jell-O
2 cups boiling water
2 packages Salad frozen strawberries
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Melt the margarine in the bottom of 8×12-inch baking dish. Stir in crushed pretzels and spread evenly over bottom of dish. Bake at 350 for 10 minutes. Cool. Using a hand mixer, combine the sugar and cream cheese. Fold in Cool Whip and spread carefully over crust. Refrigerate 30 minutes. Prepare Jell-O with boiling water (don’t follow the directions on the box); add strawberries and let partially set. Pour over cream cheese base and refrigerate until serving.
Mom’s Favorite Recipes
Many of our moms are great cooks, and earlier this year we proved that will a fantastic selection of recipes from them. A lot of these would be great to make during the holidays, especially this one for enchiladas if your family goes the non-traditional route when it comes to Christmas dinner.
White Chicken Enchiladas
10 soft taco-size flour (or corn, if gluten-free) tortillas
2 cups cooked shredded chicken
1 16-ounce bag mexican-style shredded cheese
1 8-ounce container sour cream
1 4-ounce can diced green chiles
1 10.75-ounce can condensed cream of mushroom soup
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9×13 pan. In large mixing bowl, combine shredded chicken, sour cream, chiles, and soup and stir until well-mixed. Spoon mixture into center of tortilla, sprinkle 1-2 tablespoons of cheese on top of mixture, and roll up. Place in greased 9×13 baking pan. Repeat until tortillas and mixture are gone. *Tip, if you have some of your mixture leftover and you’re out of tortillas, pour remaining mixture on top of casserole. Top casserole with remaining shredded cheese. Bake 20-25 minutes. Take out of oven when tortilla ends are crispy and cheese is bubbling.
Our Author’s Favorite Recipes [Part 1] and [Part 2]
Several of our authors contributed their favorite Christmas recipes a couple years ago. From Beth Moore’s attempt at her Nanny’s Cornbread Dressing to Angie Smith’s Molasses Ginger Cookies, our authors have great taste! Here is Jen Wilkin’s take on bread pudding:
White Chocolate Bread Pudding
3 tablespoons butter, melted
3 cups whipping cream
10 ounces white chocolate morsels
1 cup milk
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
8 egg yolks
1 ½ loaf French bread (baguette), sliced into 1/4 inch pieces
8 ounces white chocolate
3 ounces heavy cream
Strawberries or raspberries for serving
Vanilla ice cream for serving
Preheat oven to 275 degrees. Pour butter into a 13×9-inch baking pan, or in bottoms of 8 large ramekins. In the top of a double boiler over hot water, combine cream and white chocolate; stir until white chocolate is melted. Remove from heat and set aside. In sauce pan, heat the milk, sugar, eggs and egg yolks until warm, stirring constantly to keep the eggs from cooking. Pour the chocolate mixture into the egg mixture, whisking constantly.
Place the bread slices into prepared baking pan, about three layers deep. Pour 1/2 of the mixture over the bread and let settle for a while, making sure the bread soaks up all the mixture. Top with the rest of the mixture. Cover with aluminum foil and bake 1 hour. Remove the foil and bake for an additional 15 minutes until the top is golden brown.
To make the White Chocolate Sauce, heat white chocolate and cream in top of double boiler until melted and smooth. Spoon over bread pudding. Blend strawberries or raspberries in food processor until smooth. Drizzle over bread pudding. Finish each piece with a small scoop of vanilla ice cream, and serve.
The Minter Kitchen
Our author Kelly Minter is well-known for her recipes. Not only are they included in every study, but she has also shared several with us through The Minter Kitchen. Make this frittata on Christmas morning for a protein-filled breakfast to help you get through an early (and perhaps long) day.
Sundried Tomato, Arugula & Goat Cheese Frittata
6 large eggs
1 cup milk
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 ounce soft goat cheese crumbled
1/4 cup olive oil
1 clove garlic finely chopped
1 1/2 cups sundried tomatoes
3 to 4 cups arugula, roughly chopped, plus 1/2 cup for garnish
Extra virgin olive oil for drizzling
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a large bowl, whisk eggs and milk together until smooth. Season lightly with salt and pepper. Add goat cheese and stir once. Set aside. In a large skillet over medium heat, warm the 1/4 cup olive oil until slightly glistening. Add the garlic and saute until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add chopped arugula and sundried tomatoes, stir to mix, cooking for 1 minute. Pour the egg mixture over garlic, arugula and sundried tomatoes and cook until the mixture begins to set, about 5 minutes. Place skillet in the oven and bake until the frittata has set and is golden brown on top, about 10 to 15 minutes.
If you make a turkey on Christmas Day, we suggest using the leftovers to create a tasty Turkey Gumbo. Follow these simple step-by-step instructions. If you’re not making turkey, here are a few other soups to try. And don’t miss the sweet treats from HomeLife Magazine!
What are you cooking up this Christmas season? We would love to hear in the comments!
