Winter baking is not just for the holidays, and your peers have brought you some amazing, delicious ideas for winter baking/cooking and holiday treats to have with your family at home!

Ella Varetimos’s Koulourias 

Eighth-grader Ella Varetimos bakes Greek cookies called koulouris. “We make them during the year but we bake them every winter, too,” Varetimos said.

Varetimos said she usually bakes them with her mom, sisters, and grandmother. “My grandmother used to live in Greece and she brought the recipe with her to America, then shared it with our family. We love the cookies so much,” Varetimos said.

Isabelle Bresette’s Eggnog

Senior Isabelle Bresette spends the holidays with her family and makes homemade eggnog. “My grandpa makes eggnog and he has been since my mom was a baby. He calls it ‘hocus pocus’,” Bresette said.

Bresette said he makes all of her family members gather around him and the eggnog bowl at their holiday dinner and he sprinkles a bunch of different spices in it and orange bitters. “Then my grandpa mixes it around and says hocus pocus three times and we all drink it. It’s supposed to make us not wake up for when Santa comes,” Bresette said.

Riley McDonald’s Chex Mix

Senior Riley McDonald’s Mother makes a special homemade Chex mix every Christmas Eve. “Some of the ingredients she uses are Chex cereal, pretzels, and peanuts,” McDonald said.

Jamie Lawton’s Scottish Shortbread

Leading up to the holidays, senior Jamie Lawton’s sisters and Mom make Scottish shortbread. “It’s my nana’s recipe, and she always makes it around the holidays so my mom has been doing it ever since she’s had a family and been married,” Lawton said.

Lawton said her mom purposely makes extra Scottish shortbread to handout to their neighbors and uncles that live nearby.

Gracie Davis’s Homemade Cookies

Senior Gracie Davis’s mom makes delicious homemade peanut butter cookies with Hershey’s kisses on top. “She usually makes it with either me or one of my siblings. She hasn’t been making it for too long, probably only about five years but it became a tradition every winter,” said Davis.

Davis said her mom usually makes them two days before Christmas to get her family excited, her family has always loved Christmas cookies but they never made them before this tradition.

This is also a tradition at sophomore Mackenzie Vetorino’s house. Every year she and her family make these cookies and they are gone within the hour. “They are so good, I like to eat the chocolate first,” said Vetorino.

Katy Shaw’s Chicken Wrapped Bacon

“My sister and I have made chicken wrapped bacon for the holidays for the past five years,” senior Katy Shaw said. Shaw says it tastes very good and everyone loves it at her huge family dinner during the holidays!