Spectacularly fun! :-)

I made French Christmas cookies, as I do every year, both because they are a
tradition, and because everyone around here began clamoring for them the morning
after Thanksgiving!

This year, as I have in the past few years, I made the commitment to finding a new
cookie recipe to love. I did it! They are called cappuccino love bites (my daughter
said "they're called love bites because you fall in love with them!). They are
similar in texture to a good sugar cookie...you know the kind with the crisp edges
and chewy interior? The dough is formed into balls and rolled in a combination of raw
sugar and instant espresso. I'll include the recipe below. Try them, they are soooo
good.

We also made snickerdoodles, and something my daughter decided should be named
snickeldoodles. I don't know if ya'll have seen them but they have caramels in little
bits now (about the size of chocolate chips) so you don't have to unwrap them. Well,
we thought they looked like chocolate chips, so we should have them in a cookie...and
snickerdoodles just seemed like a good fit :-) They were! We put a few into the
center of each ball before rolling in the cinnamon sugar.

The last little treat we made was peppermint meringues, which we sprinkled with
crushed candy canes and dipped the bottoms in melted bittersweet chocolate. My niece
graciously informed me as they were leaving that she left me 3! lol

Other contributions of the evening: 7 layer bars, decorated sugar cookie trees (green
tinted lemon glaze, yum!), peanut butter white chocolate cookies, bittersweet
chocolate truffle cookies, Russian tea cakes, and almond-oatmeal crescents.

All in all, I declare this year's cookie party a complete success :-) If you've never
had one, I really encourage you to give it a try.

kimberly

Cappuccino Love Bites
1/2 cup (1 stick) softened butter
1/2 cup shortening (I used Smart Balance)
1 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 tbsp espresso (or use 1 tsp instant espresso with 1 1/2 tbsp hot water or use
coffee liqueur)
2 1/4 cup flour
1/2 cup raw or demarera sugar
2 tbsp instant espresso or coffee

Preheat oven to 350* f
Cream butter and shortening. Add 1 cup sugar, baking powder and salt; mix well. Add
egg, vanilla, and espresso. Mix well, then add flour.
Chill one hour, or until dough is firm enough to handle.
Combine raw/demarera sugar with instant espresso/coffee. Roll dough into balls (about
1 inch) then roll in the coffee/sugar mixture. Place on lightly greased cookie sheet
(I used parchment instead).
Bake 10 minutes, or until tops are crackled and sides are set. Immediately after
removing from the oven, press a chocolate kiss into center of cookie if desired. (We
used Hershey's hugs-white and milk chocolate swirled- in about 1/2 and bittersweet
chocolate chips in the other half..both were good. We also used a small offset
spatula to swirl the kisses when they melted).

Enjoy!