Christmas

Christmas cookie baking starts Thanksgiving weekend for one food editor. Together with her mother, she makes family favorites like the buttery balls below.

Perfect for the holiday season. Cranberries add tang to the filling of these colorful sandwich cookies. You will have some small unsandwiched cookies, too.

If you can't find Yukon Gold potatoes, use russets instead.

Eggs provide the leavening in this spiced cake, and melted butter keeps it tender.

To go with the crispy oysters, place sliced beets on a bed of frisée and top with balsamic dressing, crumbled blue cheese and toasted walnuts. Finish with wedges of angel food cake and caramel sauce.

Rick Rodgers, cookbook author and teacher, says, "I've always thought of mashed potatoes as an everyday way to serve potatoes, but scalloped potatoes really say special occasion to me. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter—they all call for scalloped potatoes, not something as humble as mashed. And since I've never been one for bland food, I kept fiddling with the amount and types of cheeses until I got this full-flavored version. If you like it with turkey, wait until you try it with the Easter ham."

Spicy and sophisticated.

Cranberries are cultivated in Canada, and tradition there calls for hosts to make a punch for Christmas guests. Here, the crop and the custom merge in a delightful champagne cocktail, which takes a French turn with the addition of crème de cassis.

When shopping for ham, be aware that smoked pork shoulder is available partially or fully cooked. This will affect the braising time (partially cooked takes about 1 hour longer). We found that blanching the ham before braising helps eliminate excessive saltiness in both the ham and the broth. Leaving the skin on the ham adds body to the resulting sauce.

Buffalo meat can be very red, even when cooked to medium-rare. Don't be alarmed — this is a naturally occurring phenomenon that has to do with the animal's diet and how little fat is marbled through the muscle. While testing this recipe, we learned that buffalo meat varies in quality; the purveyors whose meat we like best are Wild Idea Buffalo Company (866-658-6137; wildideabuffalo.com), Jackson Hole Buffalo Meat Company (800-543-6328; jhbuffalomeat.com), Arrowhead Buffalo Meats (877-283-2969; arrowheadsteaks.com), and D'Artagnan (800-327-8246; dartagnan.com). Before you begin roasting your buffalo, roughly calculate the total roasting time: Plan on about 16 minutes per pound once the oven temperature is reduced to 350°F (20 minutes per pound for beef), but start checking the temperature of either type of roast about 30 minutes before you think it will be done. Active time: 40 min Start to finish: 5 1/4 hr (4 3/4 hr for beef)

Although labeled fully cooked, the ham will still need a gentle baking for maximum tenderness and flavor. Be sure the Cranberry Mustard and the Whole Wheat Date Rolls are close at hand and that the ham is sliced thin for those who would like to make small sandwiches.

French for "crunch in mouth," a classic croquembouche is made with custard-filled cream puffs coated with caramel and stacked in a tall pyramid shape. Here, these chocolate-cream-filled puff pyramids are scaled down to individual servings and drizzled with a chocolate glaze.

Wendy Popp of Richmond, Virginia, writes: "My job as a physical therapist and my hobby, horseback riding, keep me pretty busy. But my sons — Sammy, two, and Weston, four — keep me moving the most, which has changed my cooking style. In fact, a friend and fellow mom had a great idea for a cookbook that she wants me to help her write. We would call it The One-Arm Gourmet, and it would be filled with quick dishes you can make while holding a kid in one arm and cooking with the other. "

Active time: 40 min Start to finish: 50 min

Dark beer and molasses add rich depth of flavor to this moist and delicious cake.

Pack the candy in decorative holiday tins (antique ones, if you can find them).

The warm caramel flavors in cola complement the molasses and brown sugar in this cake. The remaining candied kumquats are delicious served over vanilla ice cream. For best results, use Philadelphia-brand cream cheese in the frosting.