Fruitcake Squares

I know, I know - fruitcake? I saw this recipe and it made me wonder if I've ever actually tried fruitcake or if I just assume I won't like it - cuz really...fruitcake? Well whether or not you like fruitcake you might want to give this recipe a try - they are really good!

You bake a crumbly buttery shortbread first layer, then top with a fruit and nut mixture and bake again. The recipe makes a 13x9 pan but I had my concerns that if I didn't like it what was I going to do with that much, so I cut the recipe in half and made it in an 8x8 pan - I wish I would have made the full recipe though, it went fast.
Note: the recipe calls for "icing sugar" in the crust, I assumed that is powdered sugar and it worked, so go with that.








I used a jar of maraschino cherries (only red, the magazine picture has green and yellow mixed in - only using red tasted good and is still pretty) that I drained and roughly chopped.

I packaged them up in little baggies and took them to the ladies in my tap class - no one had heard of fruitcake like this before and seemed to enjoy them. I will definitely make these again.

Don't be afraid of the fruitcake...well at least don't be afraid of the fruitcake squares :)

click here for the recipe.

Crunchy Fruity Granola

Janis has been making this recipe for years, it came out of a children's cookbook so I was thinking it was going to be super sweet or something to get kids to eat it haha, but it isn't - and it's really good!

I've never made granola before, turns out it isn't hard at all and you can easily control the ingredients - just put in what you like. I added white and dark chocolate chips, and sprinkled a little coarse salt in...yum.

Dave is allergic to nuts and it's not easy to find granola without them, so I made him a batch with cranberries, raisins, sunflower seeds, and chocolate chips filled with coconut - delish.

I  have a couple tips for you (and myself next time):

(1) actually read the directions all the way thru before you start, or you'll be picking the cranberries and raisins out of the mix before baking it like me...

(2) instead of spraying the baking sheets with non stick spray like we did, use parchment paper! It stuck to the sheets pretty good and took a lot of scraping to break it up.

We made 5 batches and ended up with 11 pint sized mason jars full. To give as gifts we cut circles of Christmas paper for the top and are putting ribbon around the lid.