St. Nicholas Family Party
Hospitality Team Guide—Recipes
from Open Doors by LeaderResources
Christmas food ideas are endless but here are a few of our favorite ones from the website that has everything you need to know about St. Nicholas. If you want to find more, go to recipes.
Name Tags
Recipes
St. Nicholas Hot Chocolate
St. Nicholas Surprise Purses
Spice cookies
St Nicholas Cupcakes
Dutch Almond Butter Bars #1
Dutch Almond Butter Bars #2
Speculaas Ginger Cookies
Spice Cookies
Spice cookies are traditional European St. Nicholas Day cookies. You can use your own favorite spice cookie recipe check out some of these recipes. You can order bishop cookie cutters (or other shapes) from these sources or just draw the outline of a bishop on cardboard, cut it out and use that as a template to cut the cookie dough. Bake and then decorate your cookies as you fancy!
Here's one easy and moderately healthy recipe that can be made in quantity:
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1 (18.25 ounce) package yellow cake mix (alternatively, use spice cake mix and either omit or cut the pumpkin spice in half)
1/2 cup quick-cooking oats
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1 egg
1 (15 ounce) can solid pack pumpkin
2 tablespoons canola oil or apple sauce
In a bowl, combine the cake mix, oats and pumpkin pie spice. In another bowl, beat the egg, pumpkin and oil; stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Drop by 2 tablespoonfuls onto baking sheets coated with non stick cooking spray; flatten with the back of a spoon. Bake at 350 degrees for 18-20 minutes or until edges are golden brown.
Frosting
3 cups confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon grated orange peel
3 tablespoons orange juice
In a bowl, combine confectioners' sugar, orange peel and enough orange juice to achieve desired spreading consistency. Frost cooled cookies.
Dutch Almond Butter Bars #2
This is another version of the almond butter bars that doesn't use almond paste which can be a bit expensive for large groups.
1 cup butter
1 1/4 cups packed brown sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
1/2 cup blanched slivered almonds
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9 x 13 inch rectangular baking pan. Cream together the brown sugar and the butter. Add the almond extract. Sift and add flour to the creamed sugar mixture. Mix well.
Separate the egg, and add the egg yolk to the dough. Mix again.
Press into the greased sponge roll tin, and glaze with the lightly-beaten egg white.
Sprinkle with flaked or slivered almonds.
Bake about 20 minutes. When cool, cut into bars.
Speculaas Ginger Cookies
This ginger cookie may be cut into bishop's cookies or other shapes, recalling aspects of the kindly bishop's legendary life and work. Use boy or girl cookie cutters for the three young girls to whom he threw the three bags of gold for their dowries or the three little boys whom he brought back to life, or the sailors whom he saved from the storm.
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, at room temperature
2 cups dark brown sugar
2 eggs
Grated rind of 1 lemon
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg or mace
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/8 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon cardamom
1/8 teaspoon salt
4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
Optional: powdered sugar for decorative icing
In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter with the sugar until light and fluffy (electric beater works best for this). Add in the eggs one at a time, blending thoroughly after each addition. Add the lemon rind.
Sift the spices and salt with the flour and baking powder, and gradually add into the butter mixture. Do not over mix. Wrap in waxed paper or plastic wrap and chill for several hours or overnight. (If you are in a hurry, start the chilling process in the freezer: leave the dough in the freezer for about 20 minutes.)
Roll out the dough on a floured surface, to about 1/8 inch, or for larger figures to about 1/4 inch. Cut with cookie cutters, or trace around a cardboard pattern with a sharp knife. This dough can also be used with a cookie mold, or can be molded by hand. Bake at 350 degrees until lightly browned. If you like your cookies soft, remove them from the oven when they are just set—the longer the baking time, the crisper the cookie.
Optional: Paint when cool. These cookies—especially when baked in the form of Saint Nicholas—are fun to paint with colored icing.
Icing "paint"
In little pots or plastic containers, mix powdered sugar with a little bit of water (or lightly beaten egg white, or lemon juice) and a few drops of food coloring, to produce the desired shades and the desired consistency for painting. Apply with small paintbrushes.
Name Tags
One-inch stickers may be used on plain name tags to make St. Nicholas name tags. Print label PDF on Avery Removable Multi-Use Labels, 1-inch round.
Printing tips:
1) Click "File", then "Print Setup", then "Paper", on the "Size" dropdown, choose "Card envelope 4x6 in"
2) In print dialogue box, √ "Choose paper source by PDF page size"
Introduction to Open Doors
Seasonal Background
Invitation Team Guide
Communications Team: Sample newsletter & bulletin announcement, press release & poster
Event Team Planning Guide
Hospitality Team Guide
Santa and Saint Nicholas Sample talk for parents and adults
Purchase from LeaderResources. Available for download as PDFs or editable Word.docs, with full reproducible rights for the original purchaser.