So as usual around this time of year, there is usually a lot of cooking and baking done. Now normally this is shared between me and my dad making all the goodies. But this year, it’s all up to me. The hardest part though is finding all the stuff that I used to cook.

Each year family tradition means lots of little treats and most of these aren’t all that common in the USA. Things like Rocky Road, Rum Balls, White Christmas, don’t seem to be all that common over here. But doesn’t mean I am not going to make it and introduce my yankee friends. But finding some of the ingrediants has been a challenge. Small little items that I took for granted at home, are just a hassle to find. Turkish delight got a whole raft of “what is that?” from my American friends, but it was ok to find in the end. A mediterranean grocery solved that issue. Things like dessicated coconut over here isn’t that common. Sure there is coconut but it may look like it, but its not. The coconut over here seems to be wet, and wierd looking. It kinda makes the rum balls a little bit different. Obviously with no Bundy (Bundaberg Rum) over here, they will taste slightly different.

So here we have the rum balls before:

and after:

The Rocky Road though, the only hurdle was the turkish delight. I could find replacement chocolate and everything else. But it looks pretty much like it did bake home

Copha was a whole other story. Copha is essentially vegetable shortening, but unlike Crisco, its solid. I think it is because Copha is made from Coconut oil, crisco is not. So after lots of research online I managed to find a substitute:

Palmin is a German Coconut based vegetable shortening. It looks pretty much like Copha did. And it is available in Seattle at a Scandanavian Grocery and they seem to always have it in stock. SWEET! White Christmas & Chocolate Crackles are in my friends future! The mix turned out well:

and tasted pretty damn awesome (i tried a little bit)

I made some shortbread to, though not the best it was my first time making it, as I usually leave that to dad, who is the shortbread expert imo.

Next weekend will be a whole other story. Mal’s adventures with Christmas Plum Pudding is going to be a blog post alone!