Quick and Easy Holiday Dessert Recipes

Recipes for three very different treats, Crystallized Ginger Biscotti for the grown ups, Rice Krispie Squares for the kids and Easy to Fix Mix for the whole family to share.

Trish Magwood: Hi! I am Trish Magwood and today I am going to make some easy straight forward recipes that are perfect for gift giving this holiday season. My kids love these twists on a classics and guess for the kitchen they'll be best. So you don't always have to store a lot of gifts. They love to roll up their hands and get dirty and when it comes from them it is a bit messier, but it says thanks and this is for you. We are starting with three cups of vanilla flavored rice krispies and about 15 seconds move them around until they are all broken down. We are going to put in one cup of all purpose flour, putting in granulated sugar, half a cup and you need a teaspoon of baking powder to give yourself a little bit of lift. Half a teaspoon of salt to bring out the flavor and of course the holiday smell is the cinnamon and back into the food processor. So far no mess, this is easy. Now I am going to add the butter. It is a third a cup of butter and it is easiest if you keep it cooled and it is cut into chunks like this. So after about thirty seconds in the food processor we are going to take it out and just put it in a nice big bowl. Now we add three egg whites, so you have your egg separated ahead of time. I made these this week with my kids and so far there weren't arguments. It is always good to have a stool or two if you have got two kids in the kitchen. So the egg whites are in and then we add our flavor and almond extract which has a really great smell and flavor to it. You can also use vanilla extract. So we are using crystallized ginger which is really just candied ginger, delicious. You can see that it is not totally coming together until you get in there with your hands. At this point, I roll up my sleeves and we are going to roll it out on to the board. And this is going to make two logs. So once we have these perfect looking logs that are flattened to about 3 inches by about 8, they are going to go onto a parchment lined cookie sheet, 300 degree oven for about 25 minutes, you will smell them, smell delicious will start to just get a bit a brown. So they are in the oven for about 25 minutes now we are going to cut them. So you need a serrated knife and you want to cut them on an angle. So back on they go. So the biscotti was in for the second time in the oven for about 15 minutes and cooled on the rack. Now this is the fun part to make it extra triply festive you can dip it in your favorite dark chocolate. Now this is perfect for gift giving or to put out for your guest when they stop by or you could put it in a canister with a ribbon tied around for teacher's gifts, everyone is going to love you. So this is a really fun recipe to make with the kids. It is a twist on the old classic Kellogg's rice krispies squares that all kids and adults love. So we all know that we start with our big pot, you need a big wooden spoon and a bag of marshmallows. So those melt with about a quarter of a cup of butter, but you can be liberal and eyeball, there is nothing wrong with a little bit more butter. So the marshmallows and butter are all melted and add a little bit of pure vanilla extract and then about five cups give or take of our holiday rice krispies. Now I made this for my son's soccer team. We all have to bring snacks; I was the most popular mother. So you can either dust off old cookie cutters or your life can be made a lot easier because in the rice krispies box comes shape-makers in each one which is perfect. So taking one of the shapes, press it right in and then have fun decorating. The holidays can be a bit stressful, but with these easy, fun recipes and activities your family can be brought together and you will be sure to enjoy this festive time of the year.