Happy Holidays, Now Pass Me Those Cookies
This is an unabashed re-post from another year but still fits the season. Plus, I am busy baking, counting calories, and doing some on-line shopping. This is what I have to share with you today!
Like many women, I am on a constant diet. I stay away from high-caloric foods, use a sugar substitute in my ever-present coffee, and never eat desserts. And much to the chagrin of my husband, I seldom bake, not because I don’t enjoy baking but because I love what I make. Then along come the Holidays. I don’t feel they are complete unless I bake my traditional cookie recipes. Holidays are filled with traditions and baking cookies is one of them. Usually I do what I call “marathon baking.” I start early one morning and finish baking late that evening, making several hundred cookies to last us and our guests through the festive season. I make one lovely platter full of cookies for my husband to enjoy, put it on the kitchen counter, and freeze the rest. Good plan so far.
About 2:00 in the morning, I hear the cookies in the freezer calling to me. “C’mon, take just a bite. I won’t make you fat, honestly.” So I toodle downstairs to the kitchen, by-passing my husband’s cookie platter and head straight for the freezer. I take one cookie. How bad could one cookie be? Oh darn, that was good. Okay, just one more. Then I am back to bed lying to myself about my wanton cookie behavior and tossing around till I fall asleep. This would be all right if the holiday season ended tomorrow or the next day, but I have two weeks to get through this ordeal and my jeans are feeling a bit snug already.
Added to my dilemma is the fact that in recent years my husband’s family plans a cruise for all of us mid-January. That means I have to fit into that slinky bathing suit real soon. Curses! So I make plans to invite guests almost every evening. That way the cookies will be gone and I won’t hear them calling to me. Who can turn down a cookie, especially one pleading to you from the freezer? Oh, but they are sooo good.
Today I will discipline myself. I made a salad, bought my favorite dressing, and I may take a sleeping pill before I go to bed so I don’t hear those damn cookies. Why is it that men don’t go through this? My husband can eat cookies all day long and still look great. Of course, we don’t expect men to be ultra-slim and they don’t have to worry about fitting into that slinky bathing suit so the family doesn’t say, “Wow, she put on some weight since last year.” See how I fight with myself? If you have a cure for this, let me know. Otherwise pass those cookies, will ya!
—cher
I hope empathy will do because I have no solutions. I recently mused that when I go on a diet, my husband loses weight.
Plus, if this only affects you during the holidays, then I’m jealous. Food calls to me all year long. Sigh.
I hope you have a really good holiday.
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Hey Chris,
We’ll get through this, Chris. Happy Holidays to you!
I’ll take the empathy and loved your line about your husband losing your weight.
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Some men out here can empathize. I chose the holidays to try and drop some pounds before we go visit family. Staying away from all the good foods and sweets and even alcohol. It makes for a sucky holiday season. Bah humbug. Everything calls to me. Office party fudge. Rum egg nog. Wine, pizza, mashed potatoes, enchiladas, margaritas… they’re like the freakin’ Hallelujah chorus.
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Carpetbagger,
Whew! I am so gratified that some men understand this. Office parties are really difficult because people bring in their finest treats to share.
I have to say, you had me laughing out loud at the “freakin’ Hallelujah chorus” line. That—-is a classic!
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OMG!! How weird. I just posted a blog about cookies too. We seem to think alike on this subject. I can’t stop baking them and each batch is better than the one before.
Your upcoming cruise sounds wonderful. I know you’ll be blogging about it. Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays to both of you.
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Geez, Gloria, we must be on the same wavelength! That’s very cool.
And you know it is incumbent upon the one baking to test each batch just so we can make sure they are turning out all right. There can’t be that many calories in a sample, can there? Hmmm….
Merry Christmas!
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I love cookies and chocolate more then prime rib or steak and it shows on my curvaceous body.. However at 63 I’m not concerned instead I’m enjoying relatively healthy meals and when I want to eat chocolate or cookies I just do because it feels so good, and I hope I’m loved for the goodness and beauty inside me verses the smaller size I’ll never be, and those cookies in the freezer, I’d do the same… Have fun, live life, and enjoy within reason we never darn well know how long we’ll have before we can’t.
Cute post and I think most of us suffer from the same condition….the love of sugar….
Dorothy from grammology
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Dorothy S,
You always give us wise and wonderful advice. Happy Holidays to you and yours!
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My girl Pinky has the same issue… if it’s in the house, she obssesses over it until she’s eaten them all up. So I’ve taken to keeping treats in a locked file cabinet. It’s either that or ban it from the house entirely, and I don’t see why I have to suffer because she can’t control herself. I’m perfectly fine with taking out “x” amount of said treat per night and leaving it at that.
Sometimes I feel like I’m “locking the liquor cabinet” in a house full of teenagers.
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bluzdude,
I think it has something to do with the self-deprivation factor we women experience by dieting all year. By Christmas, it is overwhelming. Have patience with Pinky. This will pass….
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Guys worry about this too. Not for the same reasons, more for health reasons. I’m pretty thin, but I have to watch myself from Halloween through New Year’s. That’s when I eat my year’s intake of candy bars, cookies, brownies and chocolate. I usually gain five pounds or so. Sometime in January I look in the mirror and say, “Since when did I have boobs?” That scares me enough to lose it. It takes me six months to get rid of it.
But honestly Cher, a little extra on the backside is fine with me. So eat those cookies!!!
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Just send those little cookies to me. I happen to know that gift cookies have no calories.
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One of The Guys,
Well, you are the second of the male gender to ‘weigh’ in on watching your weight like we do! I find a lot of comfort in that, though not as much as I do from comfort foods of the Holidays.
Backsides are okay, huh? Well…maybe I’ll have just one cookie today, or maybe one and a half. Nope, not evenly distributed. Two should do just fine. Now see what you’ve started? A whole new rationalization process begins!
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Pink Monkey Chatter,
I like your reasoning! I’ll put them n a holiday tin with a bow and get them right out so you can enjoy them for both of us.
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I’ve got one solution–be a lousy cook like me!! My poor sisters in law have both finally settled for asking me to bring the simple things to our dinners, some rolls, relish tray….but I persist and I’m hoping to eek out a couple of batches of cookies here on Tuesday–a special request from my dad, until they start calling MY name…ha ha ha!
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Chocolate covered peanut butter. The only solution is to keep it out of the house, but I’m not very good at that either.
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Ahhhh…Cher….I feel for you …how unfair that you..the baker..cannot enjoy her own creative fruits of life. This is a cruel thing that has been bestowed upon the female body. We do tend to deal with so many issues all in the name of Hormones
Do they ever give us a break. As far as your cookie dilemma goes…allow yourself some for breakfast with coffee as a Christmas Treat, that way your mind will be somewhat satisfied to know that it must sleep before it gets rewarded & you have all day to work them off:)
@ The Guys…those are called ‘Moobs’ LOL…your post gave me a very funny visual
Now you best sport a photo of yourself otherwise I will forever picture you with ‘Moobs’ (manboobs)
Cher & admin…..Enjoy your cruise and at this point, Cher.. if you are not bikini ready…you may as well enjoy the cookies:)
Have a very Happy Holiday and do enjoy your cookies!
~D~
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WillOaksStudio,
You are an incredible artist, photographer and gardener. The fact that you may be “a lousy cook” actually gives me comfort. You are so good at everything else, let others make the cookies, enjoy them, and let your family enjoy the beauty you provide year-round!
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sharkbytes,
Chocolate covered peanut butter should be illegal. When I was pregnant, I allowed myself treats. If we didn’t have the above-mentioned, in the house, I would reach for a jar of peanut butter, grab a tablespoon and stand over the kitchen sink while I drizzled chocolate syrup over it. Yikes!
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Dorothy L,
Yes, women and our hormones, like the Tale of Two Cities—-the best of times and the worst of times! I can get into my slinky suit as of now. I just need to keep the discipline and run my legs off on the treadmill.
Moobs? Did you hear that Guys? Oh my gosh, that’s a new one for me and such a visual!
Happy Holidays, D….
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Cher. No cure for this. Our neighbor brought over an array of homemade cookies, cupcakes, and things that have no name in my lexicon, but I ate them.
I weighed myself the other day, after . . . a year? Two years?
Was at a ‘regular low’. Sorry, gal. I don’t have to get into slinky suits, although in grey Puget Sound my tan is long, long gone, and the skin tone needs therapy.
(Still devilishly handsome in the lagoon of my own mirror).
Enjoy the holidays — and the goodies!
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Trulyfool,
“(Still devilishly handsome in the lagoon of my own mirror).” Honestly, you do come up with the best lines! That one is a keeper.
I finally weighed myself today. I’m just two pounds over my “cruise weight” so if I remain diligent, I should be all right.
You enjoy the holidays as well. This year when I tally my blessings, I will thankful that I found you and your erudite blog, both treasures.
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I’m with you about the perils of baking. My problem is that I’m not tempted by the cookies too much, but I love the cookie dough. This means that I need to act as quality control by tasting the dough as I bake (even though I’ve followed the recipe precisely.)
I need to find a type of cookie that I don’t like that everyone else loves so that I can enjoy the baking and the smell of cookies baking without all that temptation. Maybe finding such a cookie to bake will be one of my New Year’s resolutions.
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Tina T,
You had to mention cookie dough! I don’t eat the cookie dough, but in the summer I love a bit of cookie dough ice cream. I do think you are onto something with the recipe search for cookies you do not want to eat. I need to ponder that one too.
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And I thought I was alone in my suffering. What a relief to know I’m not the only one who hears the wild cookie call my name. Although actually I have a bigger struggle with danish, especially cheese danish. If it were possible to harness the energy I’ve expended resisting cheese danish, we could depend far less on foreign oil and would probably have gotten to Mars sooner.
Anyway, fight the good fight, and know that you have many, many sisters doing their own silent battle with these deadly enemies we dare not love.
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Forgot to mention that I have one of those fancy scale that talks to you. The last time I attempted to weigh myself, I was informed: “If you want an accurate reading, one of you will have to get off.”
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Melody,
No, you are certainly not alone. The sisters must stand together in this resistance effort!
Your line about your talking scale was so funny.
Toss that thing and get one that whispers sweet nothings. Oh no, I mentioned “sweet.” See? I can’t get past this thing!
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Cher,
I know what you mean. I call people sweetie and honey; I say things like, you look good enough to eat, or, she’s worth her weight in creme brulee. Do you think therapy would help, or is it too late for us?
If we’re ever invaded, women like us could just stand hip to hip to hip and they wouldn’t have a chance of getting by.
I have to believe we’ll triumph, though, and it will be sweet. It’ll be the Maraschino cherry on top of the whipped cream on top of the hot fudge sundaes of our lives!
Melody
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Melody,
Your name suits you so well. You are a melody of wondrous thoughts and indeed a treasure. You, my friend, are the maraschino cherry on top of the whipped cream, sweet and delightful!
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Oh Melody, by the way, who said resistance is futile? We are women, hear us roar—-with laughter!
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Cher, my dear, (or is that redundant?)
You are the newest in a life full of blessings. I’m so glad we met. Be well, be happy and continue to be a light in this dark world.
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Melody,
Thank you…for being you. Let’s toast to the next twenty years! Cheers, my friend.
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