About the Cookbook and the Author

For years, Yvette van Boven has been writing Christmas recipes for newspapers and magazines. As someone who loves the holidays, she’s never short of ideas for celebrations and finally decided that now is the perfect time to publish them in a cookbook: Home Made Christmas. The holidays can be overwhelming, but Yvette shows you how to make them easier with her “make ahead” recipes, giving you time to enjoy your company when they arrive. Home Made Christmas includes more than 100 recipes for the holidays (organized by Prepare Ahead and To Finish It Off) that are all easy to make and delicious. With her step-by-step recipes, you’ll know exactly what to do and when. Yvette even provides menu ideas to make all your planning easier. Whether you’re celebrating your first Christmas with the love of your life or cooking for your entire family, this cookbook makes sure you’re fully prepared to entertain your holiday guests with a delicious, satisfying meal.

Review

This is the 3rd cookbook that I have had the pleasure of reviewing for Abrams Dinner Party.  I love new cookbooks and pouring over the pages and drooling over photos of dishes.

This cookbook is more than just recipes and meal plans, it is starting traditions with your family, creating some staples for your pantry, and even enjoying some gorgeous winter photos to get you in the holiday mood.  But speaking of meal plans – there are 13 menus including two for vegetarians.  There are menus for as few as two people to 12 or more.  There are recipes for everything from beverages to appetizers, from main courses to dessert, and everything in between.  Some dishes are a little more intense and others are super easy.  I have flagged several recipes and I am even going to try my hand at making mincemeat and then the mincemeat fudge for my book club sweet treat exchange.  Before you think that mincemeat is meat and that is a weird ingredient for fudge, it is actually a combination of rains, currants, candied fruit, apples, and a bunch of seasonings.  I know I always kept mincemeat pie at bay but now that I know what is really in mincemeat I am going to have to give it a whirl sometime soon.

This is actually the first cookbook I used when looking for a dessert option for a dinner party I was attending and that is mostly because the other two (from the Abrams Dinner Party selection) don’t really have many dessert options.  After looking at the ingredients and weighing my options for time to make etc, I opted to try the Chocolate Caramel Pie (pg 228-229).  Let me tell you, this was amazing!  It is rich and paired with some vanilla ice cream it is the perfect dessert.  The recipe was easy to make and I even found dark chocolate chunks at my local Kroger so I didn’t have to coarsely chop a dark chocolate bar.  I didn’t have a tart pan (I thought I did but if I did it has disappeared!) so I used a springform pan.  The only thing I would have done differently is to make the parchment paper inside longer so it would have been easier to remove.  It wasn’t hard but I can see where it might have been a bit easier.

I took two photos, one without the cocoa on top and one with cocoa.