During the holidays I like to prepare a simple chocolate candy, both dark chocolate and white chocolate. Making the candy is very easy and quick, and it is a treat that doesn't stay around for long. There are just two ingredients in the candy, chocolate and chopped nuts.

Melting the chocolate

It is best to melt the chocolate in a double boiler on top of the cooker. If you elect to use the microwave, be very careful as you can cook the chocolate instead of simply melting it. Reduce the power of the microwave and open the door often to stir the chocolate. I recommend that you do not use the microwave and use the double boiler as you will be less likely to cook the chocolate, and the double boiler will keep the chocolate melted as you make the candies.

Chocolate has completely melted

Nuts added to the melted chocolate

Once the chocolate has completely melted and there are no little lumps left, it is time to add your chopped nuts. I used chopped English walnuts for the dark chocolate, and chopped pecans for the white chocolate. Stir the nuts into the chocolate until they are completely mixed in with the chocolate.

Forming the candy

To form the candy, place a sheet of parchment paper on your worktop. Using a spoon, simply scoop up a bit of the chocolate and nuts mixture and drop onto the parchment paper. I don't worry about each being the same size; if you want perfectly formed candy, then you will need to buy some candy moulds. The white chocolate candies are made exactly the same way as the dark chocolate candies.

Dark chocolate with chopped walnuts

White chocolate with chopped pecans

These are delicious candies and they will definitely be a hit with your holiday guests. Don't be surprised if they quickly disappear.

All through the years when I was growing up, a part of the holiday season was Mum baking a fruitcake. When I was little, I simply watched as my sisters help Mum in the kitchen with mixing the ingredients together and baking the cake. Later when my sisters had left home, it was just me and Mum together in the kitchen baking the holiday fruitcake. Mum is now gone but the holiday would not be the same without baking a fruitcake; in a way it is a connection to Mum and the memories, often accompanied by tears, flow freely.

The cost of the ingredients for making a fruitcake has risen over the years; it is not a cheap cake to bake, so I opted to leave out the additional candied pineapple and candied cherries that we usually included. The container of candied fruit contains some pineapple and cherries anyway, but we usually increased the amount of those two.

The Ingredients:

228 g (1/2 lb) butter

500 ml (2 cups) pecans

500 ml (2 cups) dried dates

500 ml (2 cups) raisins

750 ml (3 cups) plain flour

907 g (2 lbs) candied fruit

500 ml (2 cups) brown sugar

Six large eggs

In addition to the ingredients listed above, you will add to 500 ml (2 cups) of the flour, 5 ml (1 tsp) of nutmeg, and 5 ml (1 tsp) baking powder. Set aside 250 ml (1 cup) of the flour to use to coat the nuts, dates, raisins, and candied fruit. Cream together the brown sugar and the melted butter until they are fully incorporated. Add the eggs to the brown sugar and butter one at a time until the mixture has come together in a nice smooth consistency. It is best to break your eggs into a bowl first so you can remove any little bit of eggshell that might slip in. A tip to preventing those little bits of eggshell is to crack your eggs on your flat worktop; cracking on the side of a bowl tends to drive bits of eggshell inside the egg.

Creamed Brown Sugar, Eggs, and Butter

Before finishing the batter, take the 250 ml (1 cup) of flour that you set aside and add about half of it to the candied fruit and stir to coat as evenly as possible. Add the dates, nuts, and raisins to the candied fruit and use the remaining flour to finish coating the mixture. The idea of using the flour to coat the mixture is that it will prevent them from sticking together and allow you to better stir them into the batter so they don't clump together.

Add the remaining 500 ml (2 cups) of flour to the brown sugar, butter, and eggs mixture, add it a bit at a time so the flour incorporates evenly. This batter is going to be very thick and you want to make sure the flour incorporates into the batter smoothly without any lumps.

The Batter

In a large bowl, large enough to hold the batter and the candied fruit/nuts/dates/raisins mixture, combine everything together making sure to stir it well so that all the candied fruits, nuts, dates, and raisins are coated with batter. You will find this a bit of work as the batter is very thick.

The Final Cake Batter, Ready For The Pans

Once it is all together, and everything is coated with the batter, pour the mixture into either a tube cake pan, or two regular loaf pans. In the past I have always made the cake in a tube pan, but this year I decided to make two small cakes in loaf pans. To make the removal of the cake from the tube or loaf pans easy, cut parchment paper to fit the shape of the bottom of the pans and line the bottom of the pan before filling the pans with the batter. Be sure to press the batter into the pans so there are no air gaps.

Ready For The Oven

Place the filled pan(s) into a moderate oven set to 180°C, 350°F, gas mark 4. The amount of time will vary depending on the type of pans used; however, expect about an hour or more cooking time. I check the cake near the expected time and wait for the tops to brown to a pretty golden brown colour. Once the fruitcake is done, remove from the oven and allow to cool before removing from the pan. To help remove the cake from the pan, carefully work around the edge of the pan with a flat utensil; the cake should slide out easily with the use of the parchment liner.

The Finished Fruitcakes

This fruitcake is a very rich cake, and tastes better than any fruitcake I have tried from a shop. It is best to bake this fruitcake ahead of the holidays so that the flavours of the ingredients have time to permeate the cake. Your holiday guests will really enjoy visiting for a cup of coffee and a slice of your home-baked fruitcake; don't be surprise if they return for a second slice.

The snow finally tapered off this morning and has stopped completely. The forecast has changed to snow showers on and off throughout the day, but with little additional accumulation. I am going to consider myself snowbound for the day. The roadway in front of my house is still very much covered in snow and traffic has been almost nonexistent. I don't expect the snowploughs until late in the day. I may venture out later to take some photographs.

Snow Cake

The photograph above is my side porch. Whenever we get a deep snow, my table turns into a cake, a white coconut cake. I decided to include another little film; again the resolution is very low, so the quality of the film is very poor. I think I will ask Santa to bring me a nice video camera; I am sure when I wake up on Christmas morning it will be sitting there under the tree waiting for me. The film is of the front garden, and as you can see, most of it is covered under snow and the new flower bed has disappeared.

The first snow of the winter season has arrived in Hickville today. Unlike the first snow last year, this snow is going to be a major one. The forecast is calling for snow to fall throughout the day, throughout the night, and throughout the day on Saturday. I love to see the snow falling and usually it is not a big problem where I live; our snows usually quickly disappear when the skies clear. I don't mind the snow, but the cold days means expensive heating bills even with the thermostat set low.

Snow On Petunia

The petunia in this photograph has manage to survive some rather cold temperatures; we have had temperatures way below freezing for some time, yet it managed to hold on. I am sure when the snow clears, it will be gone. I was almost tempted to dig it up and bring it inside, but I have limited room at the windows with the plants I did bring inside.

My camera has a video mode, but it is a low resolution mode. I hope one day I can afford to purchase a nice video camera. However, it is not a must have and I can do without for now. I made a couple of videos to try to show the snow falling; however, the low resolution of the videos makes it hard to see. The first video is when the snow first started to fall. The second video is with about one to one and half inches of snow so far.

Howard Dean, Former Democratic Party Chairman, spoke out on ABC's "Good Morning America" against the current healthcare reform bill. Dean labelled the current bill as an insurance company bailout and stated that "You will be forced to buy insurance. If you don't, you'll pay a fine." Dean further stated that the healthcare reform bill was "an insurance company's dream." This is exactly what I, and millions others, have been saying all along. It is time to start over with a real healthcare reform bill that actually helps Americans to afford healthcare not to just help line the pockets of special interest groups such as the health insurers and pharmaceutical companies.