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The whole house smells like Christmas - wood burning and spices.  The signature Christmas cookies are served - some hanging on the tree, some in a nicely decorated box. What I love the most about these cookies is not so much preparing them, not even baking them, although the heat helps all the aroma to gently fill every corner of the house. The strongest tease to all my senses is opening the cookie box. After few days of aging in the air tightly closed container, the cookies exude the most perfect aroma - the combination of the spices blooms the nicest smell. No need to have a bite even - so satisfying!  I kept the old tradition this year of making the old-fashioned Lebkuchen cookies . I am on a journey to make it a family tradition of baking these for every Christmas. While I was growing up in Bulgaria, they were simply called honey cookies. In North America a variation of these is popular under the name of gingerbread, or 'spicy bread' in France, but everywhere ...

The things we learn from people are amazing! How important is communication, how enriching! This cake was mentioned to me last week. After six years of visiting Ana's violin teacher, I got to learn that his heritage is Icelandic. The Icelanders had the tradition of making this cake for Christmas. I only received a rough description of the cake, but got inspired to look for it - many layers of cake and dried-fruit filling is something that is worth researching. My research led to a crossroad. It was like opening the Pandora box. Instead of finding out the information and sinking into reading, I had to choose what road to follow. Apparently there are different variations of this cake. The original recipe is from sometime of 1860. The most interesting fact is, that today's Icelanders themselves have not heard of this cake. I guess, the tradition got lost in Iceland through the centuries, but very well kept here, in Canada, in the families with Icelandic heritage.  Wha...

12 days till Christmas! And the snow has just arrived!!!  It is so clean out there...  It is white! It is quiet! Our every day running is slowing down - our hearts beat normal. Our worries got buried under the heavy blanket.  The Earth is moving at a normal pace. The air is so crisp and clean - the children's laughter is ringing, the tree branches are singing, the birds wings are drawing pictures in the clouds. The chimneys' smoke is knitting a sweater to the wind. The footprints are writing a poem. It is so white! Our souls are sparkling white! We are better people! It feels like rebirth and a white beginning. It feels like a fairytale. It feels like a miracle. 12 days till Christmas! The white canvas out there temptingly invite us to write our story, to make our wishes, because the magical season has started.  Happy Christmas, everyone! What did you wish for today? My seasonal Christmas cake - surely very much chocolaty, and garnished wi...

It is this time of year, when the fragrant spices are very popular in my kitchen. There are certain types of spices that I use only at Christmas time. I feel that I ignore them for the rest of the year, but this is something I am not forcing myself on doing, it just happens... I reach for the cinnamon from time to time (rarely) in a non-seasonal time, but definitely it is the queen of the spices at Christmas time. The nutmeg is present in my savoury cuisine through the year, but I do not touch the cloves and the cardamom in any other time of the year, but for Christmas. In this cake, all these spices meet together and really bloom the taste.  It is an easy and fast desert, baked in a bundt cake form and topped with a light cream cheese frosting. The apple caramel sauce makes it extraordinary and certainly delivers the warm and cosy sense of Christmas. for the cake: 225 g unsalted butter at room temperature 380 g custard sugar 2 eggs 1 tsp vanilla e...