Giving Homemade Candy for Christmas
By Monica Resinger
A great way to save money each holiday season is to give homemade candy. I
have received homemade candies as gifts and I always love it when I do. It
gives me a chance to try new candies and appreciate the fact that the giver
spent time on me! How thoughtful! I have also given homemade candies as gifts
and found it to be a fun tradition.
With all of the following packaging ideas, be sure your candies have cooled
first before packing them. If you don't, they will stick together and become
a mess. As a bonus, include the recipe. Write it out on a pretty recipe
card, or print from the computer and include with the candies. Be sure to
include a note with the recipe that it is the recipe for the candies you gave
them whatever year it is.
There are many ways to present candies as gifts, a couple I'll mention here.
One way is to save coffee cans large or small; clean them, decorate them
(if you wish), line them with wax paper, then fill with fresh cooled candy.
You can decorate the coffee cans with a coat of spay paint and holiday
stencils, or wrap it with wrapping paper. Just use your imagination or search
the
Internet for ideas.
Another great container for candies is a tin that previously held something
else such as tea, purchased cookies or candies, etc. You may have some already, but if not, thrift stores have an abundance of them (many are decorative)
for very reasonable prices. Clean first of course, then line with wax paper
and fill with cooled fresh candy. These are great because there's a variety
of sizes that will suit your giving needs and if you look for decorative
ones, you will not need to do any decorating yourself... just add a bow and
voila!
Pretty plastic holiday plates will also work. Just neatly present the
candy, cover with colored plastic wrap and top with a bow.
Here's a delicious candy recipe to get you started:
Buckeye Balls
Position knife blade in food processor. Add half each of powdered sugar,
peanut butter, and
butter; top with cover. Process until thoroughly mixed. Shape into 1-inch
balls. Repeat process.
Combine chocolate and shortening in top of a double boiler; bring water to a
boil. Reduce heat
to low; simmer until chocolate melts. Dip each ball in chocolate until
partially coated; place
on waxed paper until chocolate hardens. Store in airtight container in
refrigerator. Yield:
about 7-dozen (4 per serving).
For many more delicious candy recipes, check out the Candy Recipe E-book:
http://homemakersjournal.com/candyrecipes.htm
Monica is the founder Homemaker's Journal E-publications, the
growing home of many fun and informative home and garden e-books, tip sheets,
articles and more! http://homemakersjournal.com/.
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