Someone's in the kitchen I watched the Barefoot Contessa's holiday show on HGTV. I learned a couple things. Which is good. But it also spurred me into a baking frenzy. Which is fine, but who's going to eat all this stuff? The good things I learned: 1. I've been using the wrong attachment on my Kitchen Aid mixer for mixing cookie dough. I've had that thing for four years. I've made a lot of cookies with it. Using the wrong attachment. I've been using the whisk. I should have been using the paddle. Who knew!? The Barefoot Contessa, that's who. 2. She had the coolest container for her flour and it was massive. The Web is a wonderful thing. I used it to find out where I could get something similar. It's an old fashioned glass jar. They have a huge one -- 2 gallons -- that's not on the Web site. I got the 1-gallon (for flour) and the half gallon (for sugar). Merry Christmas to me. Thank you, Chrissy for picking them up for me. Anyway, I started with the jam thumbprint cookies. (I'll post the recipes in a bit, in a separate post. For now, follow the link.) These are my new favorite cookie. They remind me of Girl Scout Somoas. Or Caramel Delites, whatever they're called where you live. I'll be making more of these.

Then I made rice krispy treats (we all know what those look like, so no photo of that), a fudge wreath (see photo and recipe here. Mine didn't photograph very well) and these little things. I kinda made them up, so we'll call them cinnamon pinwheels. They were really easy. I had some pie crust dough that I hadn't used, so I unrolled it, spread some butter on it, sprinkled cinnamon and sugar all over, then rolled it back up, stopping to brush it with egg white then sprinkle cinnamon and sugar on the bottom as I rolled. then sliced it and baked it for about 12 minutes. Next time, I'd put something else other than just cinnamon and sugar. Maybe cinnamon chips? I don't know. Experiment!

And I'd already made these cheddar crackers to give to my friends and co-workers. (Recipe to come. It's in a book I have.)