Culinary Arts students At Chester High School went to Chester Grade School December 6 to host Christmas Cookie Decorating Courses for all of the 2nd grade classes.

The students, Cara Childs, Vanessa Inman, Owen Korando and Kamryn Wingerter, also made a Christmas cookbook for the students. Here are some of the recipes.

Sugar Cookies

Ready in 1 hour and 10 minutes

Makes 40 about cookies

75 calories per cookie

Ingredients

• 1 cup unsalted butter softened to room temperature
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 large egg
• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt

Preparation

1. Combine butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer (or in a large bowl and use an electric hand mixer) and beat until creamy and well-combined.
2. Add egg and vanilla extract and beat until completely combined.
3. In a separate, medium-sized bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.
4. Gradually add dry ingredients into wet until completely combined.
5. Lay out a large piece of plastic wrap and transfer about half of the dough onto the wrap (dough will be quite sticky at this point, that’s OK!).
6. Cover with clear wrap and mold into a frisbee shape. Repeat with remaining cookie dough in another piece of cling wrap. Put the dough into the refrigerator and chill for at least 2-3 hours.
7. Once dough has finished chilling, preheat oven to 350 and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Set aside.
8. Sprinkle a handful of flour onto a clean surface and put one chilled cookie dough disk onto the surface. Lightly flour the dough and roll out to 1/8″ (for thinner, crispier cookies) or 1/4″ (for thicker, softer cookies).  Continue to add flour as needed both on top of and beneath the dough so that it doesn’t stick.
9. Use cookie cutters to cut out shapes and use a spatula to transfer shapes to prepared baking sheet.
10. Once cookies are cut out, put them into the oven and bake them for 9-10 minutes, or until the edges turn light golden brown. Allow cookies to cool before moving or decorating.

Oreo Ornaments

What you will need:

*Package of Oreos (20-40 cookies)

*1 package of vanilla white candy melts

*20-40 miniature Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups

*Assorted candies/sprinkles (miniature M&M’s, Reese’s Pieces, holiday sprinkles, dragees, frosting, chocolate, etc).

Instructions

1. Melt the vanilla white candy melts according to package directions, until smooth and melted. Dip each Oreo cookie into chocolate using a fork, allowing excess chocolate to drip off. Place the coated Oreo onto a foil-lined baking sheet.
2. Immediately attach a miniature PB Cup on the top of the Oreo for the ornament topper. Then immediately decorate the Oreos with the assorted candies or sprinkles. Consider making striped, polka dot or chevron patterns, or any other pattern or arrangement you’d like!
3. Allow the Oreos to set before serving or packaging.
4. ENJOY:)

**If the chocolate dries before you are able to put the candies on, you can attach it with a little chocolate on the candy**

Grinch Popcorn

Ingredients:

• 10 cups of popped popcorn
• Salt
• 3 tablespoons of butter
• 3 cups mini marshmallows
• Green food coloring
• ½ cup of mini marshmallows
• Red M&M candies

Preparation:

1. Salt popcorn after popping and set aside in a large bowl
2. Melt butter in a medium saucepan on medium high heat
3. Add the 3 cups of mini marshmallows to pan and stir until melted
4. Turn off heat
5. Add a few drops of green food coloring to the marshmallow mixture until you reach the perfect Grinch green color
6. Add the green marshmallow mixture to the popcorn and stir until the popcorn is just coated
7. Pour the coated popcorn onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper
8. Drizzle any remaining marshmallow mixture over the coated popcorn
9. Sprinkle the remaining ½ cup of mini marshmallows and M&M candies on top
10. Allow to cool before serving and enjoy!

Chocolate Pretzel Reindeer

Ingredients

• 1 bag Pretzel Sticks
• 1 package Werther’s original caramel
• 1 package M&M’s
• 1 package Edible googly eyes
• 1 package Chocolate almond bark

Preparation

• Put 5 pretzel sticks together in a row
• Get the reindeer antlers ready by shaping the caramel into your desired antler shape
• Drizzle chocolate over the pretzels until they are covered and stuck together
• Before the chocolate cools stick a red M&M where the deer’s nose goes
• Stick the eyes where you want the reindeers’ eyes to be
• Give the reindeer’s antlers by placing the molded caramel at the top of the pretzels.

Snowman Ornaments

Ingredients

• 10 cups popped popcorn
• 1 package (10 ounces) large marshmallows
• 1/4 cup butter, cubed
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• Optional decorations: candy canes, candy spearmint leaves and assorted gumdrops

Directions

• Place popcorn in a large bowl. In a large saucepan, combine marshmallows, butter and salt. Cook and stir over medium-low heat until melted. Pour over popcorn; mix well. Cool slightly.
• With greased hands, shape mixture into 12 popcorn balls, about 3/4 cup each. Place on waxed paper. Decorate as desired; let stand until set.

Terms and Definitions

Heat- making something hot, taking it to a high temperature

Cook- prepare (food, a dish, or a meal) by combining and heating the ingredients in various ways.

Bake- cook (food) by dry heat without direct exposure to a flame, typically in an oven or on a hot surface.

Mix/Stir- to take a spoon and move around the bowl, combining everything together

Drizzle- pouring a very small stream of chocolate for example, over something else

Coat- is when you take a liquid such as chocolate and make a solid covered in chocolate

Melt- taking a solid piece of chocolate and applying heat to make it turn to liquid

Dough- when you take flour and butter and turn it into a dough to bake

Sanitation

What is Sanitation?

• conditions relating to public health, having things clean

Things you need to make sure you do when you’re cooking

• Have your hair pulled back into a ponytail if it’s long enough to be
• Always wash hands with soap and hot/warm water
• Make sure you have clean hands, hair, and clothes
• When preparing the food, don’t lick your fingers
• Sleeves rolled up always have adult supervision
• Don’t wear jewelry(rings,bracelets,etc)
• Wear shoes, not sandals
• Make sure to clean up your mess while cooking and after you have finished cooking
• Don’t eat batter/dough that has eggs in it, you can get sick