Chestnuts roasting on an open fire and dancing sugar plums are treats closely associated with the joy of the holidays. However, what traditional dessert will actually find a place on the holiday dinner table?
Chef Robert Bennett of Classic Cake in Washington Township said the Yule Log or Buche de Noel, which has been popular in France, Belgium and other Christian-populated countries for decades, is becoming very popular in local bakeries this holiday season.
“We’re making them by the thousands,” Bennett said. “It’s a rolled cake in countless flavors, decorated with combed butter cream icing made to look like bark. Then I decorate it with leaves, poinsettias, meringue mushrooms or chocolate shavings to make it look like a log.”A chocolate cake Yule Log with caramel filling and chocolate butter cream icing is a popular selection this season, Bennett said.
“The Yule Log is very popular and very easy to serve,” he said. “And it stores very well.”
A Yule Log will stay fresh for up to a week when stored in the refrigerator or the dessert can be frozen for future use.
“Freezing won’t harm the cake at all,” Bennett said.
Another cake roll that has been popular at Duffield’s Bakery in Sewell is the red velvet cake roll. “It’s filled with cream cheese filling and there’s nothing on top so it’s a red cake,” said Tracy Duffield, spokesperson for her family’s business. “This year we’re selling a lot of those.”
Pumpkin pies, a Thanksgiving favorite, are also a big seller during the Christmas season, as well as apple pie, apple cake and lemon meringue pie, according to Duffield. However, when thinking of a traditional holiday dessert, most revelers think of Christmas cookies. Bennett said cookies are one of the biggest holiday traditions and will last for weeks when kept in tins. “We have snowmen cookies, trees, stockings, all made of all-butter shortbread and decorated with different colored sanding sugars,” he said. “For the trees, we use green sugar and different colored nonpareils that look like Christmas lights.”
The bakery at Duffield’s makes homemade, traditional cookies fresh each day. “Many people don’t have time to bake these days, so they can come in and get chocolate chip and gingerbread men ... all the traditional cookies they may not have time to bake themselves,” Duffield said. She agreed that cookies have a long shelf life and said keeping them in covered containers will keep them fresh.
“Also, if you keep a piece of white bread in the container with the cookies, it will help keep them chewy longer,” Duffield said. The bread absorbs moisture and keeps the cookies fresh, she said. “We’re making gingerbread men by the hundreds of thousands,” Bennett said. He said gingerbread man cookies, a tradition that dates back to 16th-century England, are fun to make and decorate. “I use fondant,” he said. “I do white eyes and a red smile, green buttons and a red bow tie.”