504 holiday recipes

Santa Claus cookies decorate flat sugar cookies with red sugar caps, miniature marshmallow tassels, currant eyes, cinnamon candy noses, and coconut beards. A festive holiday craft cookie kids can help build from baked rounds.

Classic giblet gravy made the old-fashioned way: simmered chicken or turkey giblets folded into a rich pan-drippings roux thickened with their own savory broth. The from-scratch holiday gravy your bird deserves.

Microwave roast turkey with pan gravy cooks a 12-pound bird in under 90 minutes using the breast-down, breast-up method. A speedy small-kitchen solution for holiday dinner without tying up the oven.

Lady apple fruit wreath ringing a holiday roast with spiced crabapples frosted in tinted cream cheese and rolled in toasted pecans, set on a bed of parsley. A retro edible garnish for your festive platter.

A layered no-bake caviar pie built in a springform pan: egg salad base, chopped scallions, whipped cream cheese and sour cream, crowned with black and red caviar. The ultimate make-ahead appetizer for holiday entertaining.

Had some puff pastry on hand from the holiday baking, and made this apple strudel. It was great, the puff pastry certainly delivered a much richer result than phyllo pastry that I normally use. No leftover, we ate it all!

How to roast a whole turkey in the microwave: finish the bird in a roasting bag at reduced power, then rest it tented under foil so it cooks through and stays juicy. A faster route to a moist holiday bird.

This is a favorite dish of my family's, especially on holidays like Easter and Christmas. Most people cringe at the idea of eating a cow's tongue, but actually the meat is very tender, and even if you have to close your eyes and plug your nose to try it, please do. I guarantee it won't be what you expect!