More than twenty years ago, when my Auntie Elinor was living in Riverside, Illinois, she began sending me the special holiday cookbook that her local newspaper published. It was packed with all kinds of recipes that readers had shared. I always loved reading through its pages.
One year, as I read through the recipes, I came upon an interesting cookie called Horns. Tender pastry dough, rich with butter and sour cream, is rolled out thin and sprinkled with a cinnamon-sugar-nut mixture.
Wedges of dough are rolled up and baked. The dough is very nice to work with and rolls out very easily. If you haven't had a lot of experience with pastry dough, this is one you'll want to try. It's very user-friendly.
Here in Maine we await a "super storm" that is huge and rushing across the United States, or so they say. Six to twelve inches of snow, turning to freezing rain with high winds. Sounds like Winter weather in Maine, not too unusual. It isn't the size of the storm it's what you find to make it fun that counts and I have a plan to enjoy it! In between plowing I will be making our Mother's tortiere pies and perhaps having a slice for lunch and another with a pot of hot tea in the afternoon to warm up.
I grew up singing Bach hymns before dinner. We were all terrible singers, but it didn’t matter: my mother trained us to sing in parts. Children, adults and even teenage boys would toil our way through “Now Thank We All Our God.” My mother wasn’t interested in musical quality, but in the virtues of complexity and genius. 
from Dino and Martha De Laurentiis. It looks good in its elaborate wrapping, and tastes good, too, especially as French toast. But the reason we love it so much has more to do with its power to remind us - like a photograph - of the many evenings we’ve spent with this remarkable family - here in LA, in Florence, and, on the eve of the Millennium in, of all places, the South Pacific. 
as a Christmas present a few years ago, and I use it constantly. It's wand shaped, which makes it really fun to use. Sometimes I like to pretend it's a violin bow while I zest lemons and such. It also has a scabbard, and that's cool. The best thing about it is that your arm doesn't get tired, but your parmesan turns into fluffy, salty snow. It would fit nicely in a stocking, and you should seriously get one if you haven't already. 
. They are the perfect size for relatively guilt-free meat consumption and are always tender and delicious regardless of how rare or well-done you like yours cooked. They turn a regular steak dinner into something special. 
each year and it has become one of the highlights of the holiday season for me. While others herald the arrival of mail at this time of year, bringing cards and letters from family and friends, I anxiously await the postman's delivery of a package filled with these delicious nuts. I don't know what it is about them (they're a pain in the neck to open and I don't eat them at any other time during the year), but to me the arrival of the pistachios (like the lighting of the tree at Rock Center or the first of a gazillion broadcasts of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE) lets me know that the holidays have truly begun. 
. The blue one with the white polka dots, for example, is from Amy; the sheer, short vintage one with the letter “M” embroidered on the right breast – a gift from my stepdaughter Sal; the white-on-white striped one with the pink rickrack and the yellow, green, purple and rose circles – courtesy of my niece Jennifer. The point is not that I don’t have any; the issue with me and aprons is that I don't put one on til after the barn door is closed. When de Kooning dots of marinara dribble from my tasting spoon onto my best white blouse (the one with the trumpet sleeves, and I still don’t know how that happened because I swear I was holding that spoon right over the pot), after Rorschach blots of dark brown gravy appear on my favorite navy crepe dress, as a constellation of hot caramel from the Tarte Tatin splatters from my cast iron skillet onto my red cashmere cardigan – only then do I decide to tie on an apron. This is not good. This is not why God invented them. If only someone would call and remind me that in a battle between Minestrone and me, the Minestrone will always win – now that would be a perfect Christmas present. 
that I can use to dig a hole in my backyard and bury all the holiday cakes, candy and long interminable accounts of what the year was like for everyone in their family that are sent our way. 
! 
cookware! 
I associate mail order food with my father. When I was growing up, he and I had very few connections. He took me to only one professional football game. He never came to Back-to-School Night and had no interest in any of my hobbies. I remember him as dour, not very talkative and disapproving. I was part of his second family and he was, I’m certain, just a bit too old to have a young kid running around.