During the 12 days until Christmas break, the King Street Chronicle will again present staff favorites from the holiday season. This sixth edition will not include six geese-a-laying, but beloved Christmas songs, memories, recipes, movies, and activities.
Song: “Someday At Christmas” performed by Mr. Stevie Wonder and Ms. Andra Day.
Recipe: Gingerbread Cupcakes
Total Time: Two hours and 15 minutes
Quantity: 12 cupcakes
Ingredients:
- One and one-half cups and two tablespoons of all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
- One-half teaspoon of baking soda
- One-half teaspoon of baking powder
- Two teaspoons of ground ginger
- One teaspoon of ground cinnamon
- One-half teaspoon of ground nutmeg
- One-fourth teaspoon of ground cloves
- One-fourth teaspoon of salt
- One-third cup of unsulfured molasses
- One-half cup of buttermilk
- One-half cup of packed dark brown sugar
- One-half cup of unsalted butter, at room temperature
- Two large eggs
- One teaspoon of vanilla extract
- Eight ounces of full-fat cream cheese, at room temperature
- One-half cup of unsalted butter, at room temperature
- Four cups of powdered sugar
- One teaspoon of vanilla extract
- One-half teaspoon of cinnamon
- Pinch of salt
Steps:
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line a cupcake tin with 12 cupcake liners.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients of flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and spices and set aside.
- In a measuring glass, mix together the buttermilk and molasses. Set aside.
- With an electric mixer using the paddle attachment, cream the butter and brown sugar together until the mixture is light and fluffy.
- Mix in the eggs, one at a time, and then add the vanilla.
- Mix half the dry ingredients with the milk and molasses mixture. Add the rest of the dry ingredients and the brown sugar mixture, and mix thoroughly.
- Evenly distribute your batter among the 12 cups, filling them three-fourths of the way. Bake for 15 to 18 minutes or until a toothpick comes out with a few moist crumbs.
- Let the cupcakes cool completely before frosting.
- While the cupcakes cool, check on the cookie dough. If it is firm to the touch, it is ready. If it is still too soft, it should continue to chill.
- When ready, stamp out the cookies and place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for eight to ten minutes or until they are evenly darkened.
- Cream the cream cheese and butter together with an electric mixer. Make sure they are both room temperature so you get a smooth frosting.
- Mix in the powdered sugar, one cup at a time, until fully combined.
- Mix in the vanilla and salt.
- Fill your piping bag fitted with a large French tip and decorate your cupcakes in a swirl motion. Top with your cooled and set gingerbread cookies.
- Keep the cookies in the fridge if you need to store them for more than a few hours, and then eat them at room temperature.
Movie: Holidate
“Fed up with being single on holidays, two strangers agree to be each other’s platonic plus-ones all year long, only to catch real feelings along the way,” courtesy of imdb.com.
Activity: Paper Plate Santa
Supplies:
- Paper plate
- Red, black, white and orange paint
- Glue
- Cotton wool
- White pom-pom
Steps:
- Paint half of the paper plate a skin tone and the other half a vibrant red, with a curve around the edge of the paper plate to create a hat shape.
- Add a big red nose.
- Between the border of the skin-colored paint and red, add plenty of glue.
- Separate and thin out the cotton wool and spread along the trail of glue, leaving some space to create the appearance of a hanging Santa hat.
- Add some glue to the bottom of the paper plate.
- Add more cotton wool, fluffing it up a little to create a nice fluffy beard.
- Finish off by adding a pair of eyes using black paint and add a white pom-pom to the tip of the hat.
Memory: Mr. Cameron McManus
“This was my and Mrs. McManus’ first Christmas with a baby: Johnny, nine months old at the time. Looking at him during that time made the sheer, breathtaking beauty of Christmas hit me in a way it never had before: God, Subsistent Existence Itself, the great ‘I AM,’ became not only Man, but a baby. As G.K. Chesterton put it, ‘The hands that had made the sun and stars were too small to reach the huge heads of the cattle…[It is] something too good to be true, except that it is true.'”
Featured Image by Caitlin Leahy ’25
