Judy P's Tickle Trunk

It was a busy day in the kitchen, making up for lost time. I did the first of the Christmas baking and got a start on our smorgasbord food for Christmas day. I now got balls, lots of them. By evening I was so sick of rolling things into balls I could have screamed. As well as the rum balls and meatballs I put chicken wings on to marinate and made oatmeal brown bread with sunflower seeds and spiral cookies. Poor Lance got burdened with licking bowls and sampling batters. He doesn’t look any worse the wear for it yet. Here’s some of the food:

I like to cook my meatballs on a rack in the oven; it really cuts down on the grease.

I call them Newfie meatballs because the recipe is from a magazine from Newfoundland. They taste a bit like baked beans and are super yummy.

The rum balls are rolled in ground pecans. Tomorrow I will dip half of them in chocolate; they keep better than way.

The peach spirals look better than they taste. The peach jam I used was a little too subtle to flavour the cookies. They are not that bad that they will go to waste however.

Tomorrow I will make Richmond Maid of Honour tarts, quiche, bake a ham and maybe some mini carrot cake muffins. That ought to hold us for a while. The rumball recipe came from a patient who brought them in at Christmas back in 1992. You could smell the rum through the wrapping and they didn’t last very long. Next visit she brought me the recipe and I have been making them every year since then. Here’s the recipe:

Rum Balls

• 8oz semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• pinch of salt
• 4 cups vanilla wafers, crushed finely
• 1 1/2 cups icing sugar
• pinch salt
• 3/4 cup melted butter
• 1/3 cup cocoa
• 3/4 cup white rum
• 1 cup pecans, chopped finely
• Chocolate shot (sprinkles) or ground pecans for rolling

Combine well melted chocolate, sour cream and salt and set aside. In separate bowl, combine wafers and the rest of the ingredients except for sprinkles. Mix well until it holds its shape. Add chocolate/sour cream mixture and knead until blended and soft.  Refrigerate until firm enough to roll into small balls. Roll balls until just soft enough to pick up the sprinkles. Roll in sprinkles or ground nuts. Harden overnight in fridge. These will last up to four weeks in the fridge. If keeping longer they should be frozen. Bring to room temperature before serving to bring out the rum flavour.  Makes five or six dozen.

Enjoy.