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It’s been a rough year for a lot of people and who knows what 2021 will bring. I’m no professional, but I’ve learned a thing or two over the years from practice and from working in a bakery that might help some of you that are considering gifting baked goods next year, so here we go.

The only thing I buy on sale after Christmas would be Christmas themed dessert/treat bags since now I just bake cookies for everyone since in the long run it's much cheaper than spending $50+ per person. Last year I got some on sale for 0.50 as opposed to $1-$2. If you decide to bake cookies and have a lot of family members... find out what cookies they like and buy butter whenever there's a good sale and keep in the freezer. To not overwhelm yourself by making all the cookies on the same day, make 1-2 cookie doughs throughout the week of that month and then freeze till you need to bake them. If you didn't shape the dough into balls beforehand let the dough thaw just enough to pull apart and shape into balls, place on a baking sheet and bake for the required time. Waaay less stressful than spending all day making a bunch of different cookies from start to finish.

I prefer baking also because I know they'll enjoy it/possibly get excited for it. Buying gifts for people you never know if they'll actually use it or just donate/regift to someone, which would make me upset tbh since I thought of them when buying it and I wasted money on them and they didn’t appreciate it.

So you wanna bake cookies for multiple people but don’t have much time...

Cookie dough can be made ahead of time and frozen till needed. The two methods I do are either to wrap the cookie dough in plastic wrap and freeze it as a brick. When I need to bake cookies I take the cookie dough out and let it thaw for a few mins on the counter till I can pull it apart and shape into balls, then arrange them on a baking sheet and bake for the amount of time needed. The second method is to measure out the dough into balls, and freeze them on a parchment paper lined plate or a tray lined with parchment paper. Once frozen you can store them in a ziplock bag, box or in in Tupperware, and then place on a baking sheet and bake for the amount of time needed. There is no need to let the dough completely thaw. By freezing the dough balls beforehand it keeps them from sticking to each other, which can then lead to them breaking unevenly when trying to pull them apart. It’s a headache and a waste of time that you might not have.

If a recipe calls for sour cream and you only have plain Greek yogurt then you can substitute it for the Greek yogurt, and vice versa. Greek yogurt, sour cream or vegetable oil can make for a more moist muffin/cake.

If a recipe calls for brown sugar but you only have white sugar, you can substitute it for white sugar, and vice versa.

Some essential accessories you should have if you’re planning to bake:

-Baking sheets

-Parchment paper or if you can splurge a bit, silicone baking mats (so you don’t have to waste money on parchment paper)

-An ice cream scooper (with the little lever). So much easier to measure out your cookie dough with one of these and the lever makes it easier to get the dough out of the scoop.

-Silicone spatula (can be bought at dollar tree—Betty Crocker brand). Great for scraping cake batter completely from the bowl

-Measuring cups/ Measuring spoons. Just make sure that the measurements can’t be rubbed off the utensils because then it’ll be difficult to tell which is which (This tends to happen with dollar tree brand measuring spoons—get them elsewhere).

I frequent Dollar Tree whenever I’m near one and there are 4 things I buy there when I don’t need it in bulk because I don’t use it too much, or have since bought at Costco because I use it so much now. If you have a dollar store near you, you should not be paying more than $1 for these items:

-powdered sugar

Only worth it if you don’t use it much. If you’re planning to make a lot of cakes, then just buy in bulk from Costco or buy the bigger bag from the supermarket.

-canned pineapple

I use canned pineapple for carrot cake and even pour in some of the juice into the batter. The leftover pineapple juice I use to make a drink.

-brown sugar

**store in an airtight glass jar. Have any glass pasta sauce jars you’re tossing? Wash it very well and let it dry. Smell the jar. Still smells like sauce? Wash it again and the smell should be gone unless you had a garlic/pickle infused jar...then don’t use that jar. You don’t need mason jars to store dry ingredients. You already paid for the tomato sauce jar. Use it.

-parchment paper:

***NOT WAX PAPER. COMPLETELY DIFFERENT. Putting wax paper in the oven will cause the paper to catch fire. No one wants to deal with the fire dept so close to the holidays. If you plan to bake a lot of cookies through next year then either get some parchment paper (which can be reused a few times) or splurge and get a silicone baking mat. Reusable and lasts literal years. There are affordable ones on Amazon, but I got mine from HomeGoods 5 years ago and sometimes use them for roasting vegetables in the oven as well.

Usually when it comes to baking the two most expensive ingredients to buy for the first time are extracts (usually vanilla) or additives like nuts or dried berries.

I personally find vanilla extract to be a must for baking, but it is pretty pricey. It’s ok to start using cheap vanilla or even fake vanilla (which is the cheapest). Most people can’t really tell the difference in taste between real and fake. I started off with using a bottle of Mexican vanilla I found at Walmart for 0.99 (Molina Mexican Vanilla Blend) and have found it at the ethnic grocery store for 2.99 and at the time it worked just fine for me as I learned. Vanilla never goes bad (even with the ‘best by’ date, so you can keep it for literal years.

I have since upgraded to a 8.99 vanilla from Trader Joe’s that I’m happy with and now use the Molina Mexican Vanilla for my French toast batter.

If you don’t want to bake cookies, you can bake loaves of bread or even make your own jam!

During the summer if you find strawberries or blueberries at a really good price, buy a few containers, wash them well and then freeze them for a few months till needed. Jam can be made with fresh or frozen fruit. As long as you somewhat sterilize the jar, jam should keep in the fridge for up to a year. Banana jam is the cheapest in my opinion because I can get a large amount of bananas from Costco for less than $2. If you know anyone that has kids I’m sure they wouldn’t be opposed to receiving homemade jam to use for a PB&J sandwich or to use on some toast (it can even be used for linzer cookies).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62iSrXQHhUA&ab_channel=OnePotChefShow

Challah bread goes from $4-$6 in the supermarket, but you can bake your own loaf for less than $1 if you already have the ingredients. My family loves when I make Hokkaido milk bread (similar to challah—but fluffier and a bit sweeter) because on Sundays I use the whole loaf to make French toast for my family. You think challah French toast is yummy? You need to try Hokkaido milk bread French toast! Here is the video I used as reference, and if you make more than one loaf, you can either slice the whole thing before freezing so the person you’re gifting it to can keep it in the freezer and grab a slice when needed, or just freeze the entire loaf:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvmHqkvhzuA&t=440s&ab_channel=emmymadeinjapan

Another recipe that’s cheap to make is Italian biscotti (nuts and dried fruit are pricey, but buying chocolate chips in bulk or just making anise biscotti are the cheaper options)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2odwIl34Q_I&t=418s&ab_channel=FoodWishes

If you have rolled oats in your pantry for when you make oatmeal, then you might have everything to make my favorite oatmeal raisin cookies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdUCcdu7iUs&t=2s&ab_channel=BiggerBolderBaking

And here is a dairy free chocolate cake (no eggs, butter or milk) that even someone with allergies can most likely enjoy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86o4gUPqVKU&t=43s&ab_channel=JennyCanCook

If you want to keep it dairy free for the frosting then just sift together some powdered sugar and cocoa powder and add a tsp of water or alternative milk at a time till the desired consistency.

And here are copycat Starbucks blueberry muffins that are cheaper and yummier (they freeze well if you can’t eat a whole batch within a few days)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiVrLY6OkOc&ab_channel=SimplyYummy

If you have any baking questions or any questions in general I am more than happy to answer them to the best of my knowledge!



December 26, 2020 at 09:44PM

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