Two recipes two days in a row? (Sugar & Spice Cookie Recipe here). I’m in Christmas-baking mode and friends have been asking me to post my favorites.

As strange as it may sound, the tragic mass shooting at a school in Newton, Conn. has made my little family head to the kitchen. Cooking together is one of my favorite bonding activities with my kids and they absolutely love rolling out the dough, cutting it into different shapes and decorating with sprinkles.

I’m not a big fan of wrestling with frosting. Most sugar cookies are bland without it but not these babies. The cream cheese makes it absolutely delicious and I am always asked to divulge my secret.

To-die-for Cream Cheese Cutout Cookies

1 cup sugar
1 cup butter, softened
3 ounces of cream cheese, softened
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 egg yolk
2 1/4 cups flour (a bit more for high-altitude)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a large bowl, combine the sugar, butter, cream cheese, salt, almond and vanilla extracts and egg yolk. Beat until smooth. Stir in flour until well blended. Chill the dough for 8 hours or overnight.  (Note: I didn’t have time to do this so just added more flour so it wasn’t too sticky).

On a lightly-floured surface, roll one-third of the dough to 1/8-inch thickness, refrigerating remaining dough until ready to use. Cut into desired shapes with cookie cutters. Place 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 7-10 minutes, until edges begin to brown. Cool on wire racks before frosting (or I like to just put sprinkles on prior to baking).

These used to be a road-trip staple during my single years and were quickly devoured by everyone! They are a twist on gingerbread cookies but with a wonderful “spicy” flavor.

I traditionally love making them into small star-shaped cookies and cooking them ’til the edges are lightly browned. My husband recently divulged he doesn’t like them “overcooked” like that. To each his own but he is wrong, wrong, wrong.

My star cookie cutter went missing so I made them gingerbread-shaped. Gingerbread men without any ginger?

Just call me a rebel. But when you bite into these babies, you won’t care.

Sugar and Spice Cookies

1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 3/4 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
pinch of ground cloves

Beat sugar and eggs until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir dry ingredients and add everything together. Gather the dough into a ball; wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour or up to 3 days. Roll the dough out rather thinly. I like to use a small star cookie cutter so the edges are marvelously crispy. Bake at 350 degrees for 7-8 minutes.

These freeze well and I love to make a lot of batches to bring out later.

Last year, I stumbled upon a pretty darn awesome pumpkin waffle recipe and made it for the missionaries. They loved it and my family loves it. So much, in fact, that my kiddos beg to make the “missionary waffles” whenever a new set of them comes around. I’m always more than happy to oblige.

Because I’m a giver like that.

This really is a great December dish with all the holiday spices I love. Enjoy!

Sinfully delicious pumpkin waffle recipe

Ingredients

1/3 cup light brown sugar
• 3 Tbsp. cornstarch
• 1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 3/4 tsp. cinnamon
• 2 tsp. ginger
1 tsp allspice
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup of milk
• 1 cup canned solid-pack pumpkin
• 4 Tbsp. unsalted butter, melted and warm

Directions

1. Lightly oil the waffle iron with vegetable oil and preheat.

2. Combine brown sugar and cornstarch in a large bowl. Whisk together the remaining dry ingredients.

3. Add pumpkin and milk to the eggs. Whisk to blend and set aside.

4. Pour melted butter into thepumpkin mixture. As you pour, whisk to combine.

5. Add the pumpkin mixture to the dry ingredients, and mix them together until just combined. A bit of lumpiness is fine.

6. Once the waffle iron is heated, you’re ready to pour the batter!

We love to grill. We love pizza. But it wasn’t until a couple of years ago that we started grilling pizzas on our BBQ and we’ve never looked back. It helped that I found a killer crust recipe our very first try and it has become our signature dish when we have new friends over for dinner.

At our recent dinner party, we doubled the crust recipe so we had four pizzas and made 1) BBQ chicken pizza (BBQ sauce with marinara, chicken, onions, bacon and cilantro), 2) a cheese pizza,  2) sausage veggie and 3) my new favorite: strawberry balsamic chicken pizza.

Balsamic Strawberry Pizza with Chicken, Sweet Onion and Bacon

Ingredients:
½ cup strawberry jam or preserves
¼ cup balsamic vinegar

Pizza dough (see recipe below)

1 cup diced or shredded chicken breast (I used leftovers from a rotisserie chicken)
½ cup cooked bacon. (I was lazy and used bacon bits)
½ cup thin sliced sweet onion (precooked if you’re grilling)
12 ounces moazarella cheese
¼ cup fresh cilantro, finely chopped
¼ cup fresh strawberries, diced small

Directions:
Start with the balsamic reduction sauce by placing balsamic vinegar in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 4 to 5 minutes or until reduced to half of the original volume and mixture is thick and syrupy. Add strawberry jam, mix well. Set aside to cool.

Combine chicken with 2 tablespoons of the balsamic-strawberry mixture and mix to coat all chicken with sauce. Prep dough and pour rest of sauce onto pizza dough and spread to cover.  Scatter chicken evenly over the sauce.

Place about 3/4 of the cheese on top of dough and spread to cover sauce evenly. Scatter  bacon and sweet onion over cheese to distribute evenly. Scatter remaining cheese over this layer.

Cook the pizza (for grilling instructions, see below). Sprinkle with strawberries and cilantro. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I took the picture after we’d already eaten half of the pizza. But you get the idea!

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Tony Rosenfeld’s Grilled Pizza Crust

Makes four 10- to 12-inch pizza crusts

Ingredients

Directions:

Combine the water, yeast and sugar in a small bowl, stirring to mix well; let sit for 10 minutes to allow the top to foam and become frothy (indicating that the yeast is active). If it does not do that, discard and start again with more water, yeast and sugar.

Lightly flour a work surface; lightly grease a mixing bowl and a rimmed baking sheet with a little olive oil.

Combine the flour, salt and 2 tablespoons of the oil in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook. Beat on low speed for 1 minute until well incorporated, then add the water-yeast mixture in a slow, steady stream. Beat for about 5 minutes, stopping to scrape down the sides of the bowl as necessary, until a dough forms and pulls cleanly from the sides of the bowl. Add a few tablespoons of water or flour if the dough is too dry or wet. Transfer the dough to the prepared work surface and knead for about 5 minutes, adding a little flour if it starts to stick, so the dough becomes smooth and elastic.

Transfer to the oiled bowl, cover with a clean, dry dish towel and let sit for 1 to 2 hours at room temperature, until the mixture almost doubles in size. Form the dough into 4 equal-size balls and place on the prepared baking sheet. (Alternatively, the dough may be wrapped tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 2 days or frozen for up to 1 month.)

To roll out the dough balls, lightly flour a work surface. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper, and have ready additional large sheets of the paper for stacking the rounds of dough.

Shape or roll one of the balls into a thin round between 10 and 12 inches in diameter. Brush the top side with 1 tablespoon of olive oil and flip the oiled side over onto the lined baking sheet. Brush the new top side of the dough with 1 tablespoon of the oil and cover with a piece of parchment paper. Repeat with the remaining 3 doughs and the oil. They may be held at room temperature for about 1 hour in this manner (or refrigerate, tightly covered, for up to 3 hours. If the dough has been refrigerated, let it sit at room temperature for 30 minutes to 1 hour, so it will be easier to stretch).

When ready to grill, build a two-zone fire. Heat the back 2 burners on a gas grill on HIGH and the front burners on LOW, or light a large charcoal fire and push most of the coals to one side of the grill, leaving a sparse layer of coals on the other side. When it has reached the right temperature, the hot zone of the fire should be so hot that you can hold your hand a couple of inches above the grill for only about 3 seconds (about 500 degrees, if using a surface thermometer). Clean the grill grates well and oil them lightly with a wad of paper towels.

Using both hands to hold the top of one of the dough rounds (as if your hands were at 10 and 2 on a steering wheel), gently lay the bottom part of the hanging dough on the far side of the hot zone and stretch the top toward you to the other side. Cook, without touching, for 1 minute, so the dough bubbles and starts to get good grill marks. Rotate 90 degrees and cook for 1 or 2 minutes, or until the dough is uniformly browned and crisp but has not burned.

Pull the dough to the cooler zone of the charcoal fire or to the front of the gas grill and reduce the heat on the middle zone of the gas grill to medium-low. Flip the dough over so the seared side faces up. Sprinkle toppings evenly over the pizza (remember, less is more; see related sidebar for topping suggestions).

Once the toppings are in place, cover the grill (with the vents open on a charcoal grill lid). Cook for 3 to 7 minutes, checking every minute or so to rotate the pie 90 degrees so it cooks evenly, until any cheese toppings melt. Transfer to a large cutting board to slice. Top and grill the remaining doughs in the same manner. Serve hot.