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Edible Ornaments
Although it is now more decades
away than I care to admit too often, there were four
things I loved most about my childhood Christmases in
England:
1. the excitement of the Christmas gifts being put under
the Christmas tree, and then the family opening of the
gifts on Christmas morning;
2. the food; all the special sweets being put out Christmas
Eve; Christmas Lunch with the turkey, lots of roast
potatoes, brandy butter, and Christmas pudding being
set alight at the table;
3. all the Christmas ornaments and decorations going
up before Christmas, and most especially putting up
and decorating the Christmas tree; and,
4. the games we would play.
Food, though, did play a major part, and still does
in English homes today. So, really, it is no surprise
that food even became part of the Christmas ornament
repertoire. Food, in one form or another, became part
of the decoration of Christmas time.
From my memory, edible Christmas ornaments were usually
in the form of chocolate with a silver or gold coloured
wrapping that sparkled on the tree. Chocolate coins
were popular, sometimes more than one in a brightly
coloured string bag dangling temptingly from the Christmas
tree.
I must admit, any edible ornament on the tree became
a prime target, as I anxiously awaited the all clear
from my parents to start devouring whatever I wanted.
Later, though, a greater variety of edible Christmas
ornaments emerged, such as candy canes; then, as the
popularity of edible ornaments increased at Christmas,
people started to use their imagination to make their
own, or the local baker would make more elaborate ornaments
for sale.
Cookies, or at least cookie dough, make a good base
for ornaments, as they are easy to cut into shape. You
can use your imagination on adding the colour, such
as with Smarties or other colourful sweets. Adding a
frosting effect is not too difficult either.
If you do make dough based ornaments to hang on the
Christmas tree, remember you will need to make a hole
in the cookie before it cools; that's the way the cookie
doesn't crumble. Then when they do cool, you can thread
a decorative ribbon to hang them on the Christmas tree.
The Christmas tea table is often adorned by the prime
edible ornament, the Christmas cake. The prettier it
is, the better it is for decoration once lunch is out
of the way. Cake decoration is only limited by your
imagination. However, you can think of other things
that are less common to adorn the table as an edible
ornament. If you are skilful, you can create simple
models with ginger bread, moving up a level from the
old gingerbread man.
You will find lots of ideas online and in the stores,
but if you can come up with something original, that
is even better. Just let your imagination go and see
what you come up with. At least, if it does not look
too good, you can just eat it before anyone comments!
About the author:
Roy Thomsitt is the owner and author of http://www.xmas-ornament.com
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