[2] All of the brownies are individually wrapped for freshness, and grab-and-go.

[3] Greyston’s are the brownies in Ben & Jerry’s Double Fudge Brownie ice cream.

For people who have everything, we have long advocated gifts with a social impact.

These are gifts that support organizations like Feeding America, which provides meals to hungry people in our own country; and Heifer International, which provides livestock to third-world families so that they have food as well as eggs, milk, wool, etc. to sell and generate income.

Heifer International has a catalog (and website) that showcases the different animals that can be donated, and how they help the families who receive them. Our friends and family enjoy choosing a different animal every year; or fund education for a girl to go to school, or a woman to start up her own small business.

Some people prefer a donation to help others. Some people want a gift for themselves.

An easy compromise: products that give a portion of their revenue to help others, and products made by companies that give both job training and permanent jobs to chronically jobless Americans: released felons, former addicts, teen mother dropouts, and others who need a leg up.

Last week we presented the Women’s Bean Project, which trained women to be exemplary workers for other employers.

Today, we have two more companies worth your time.

There are numerous endeavors across the U.S. that have the same mission: to turn Americans who are not wanted by employers into those who are. If you want to support a local cause, or a help particular type of people, simply look online or ask in your community. There are always local food banks and job training programs.
 
 
1. GREYSTON: BAKERS ON A MISSION

“We don’t hire people to bake” says Greyston Bakery. “We bake brownies to hire people.”

For 25 years, Greyston has been a pioneering social enterprise based on Open Hiring: providing jobs to individuals who face barriers to employment.

The bakery is staffed entirely by people offered a job opportunity through Open Hiring. Trained at the facility, they operate a world-class food processing facility.

Greyston’s was chosen over all “contestants” to supply 35,000 pounds of brownies daily for Ben & Jerry’s Double Fudge Brownie flavor! Their award-winning brownies and cookies can be purchased online and at Whole Foods Markets.

We add our own endorsement, to the:

Learn more at Greyston.org; order your gift packages online at Shop.Greyston.Org.

The brownies are packed in a reusable covered wicker basket. Corporate and event gifts can be customized.

2. BRIGHT ENDEAVORS SOY CANDLES

Light a candle, transform a life says Bright Endeavors. The Chicago not-for-profit’s mission is to train teen moms in job skills.

So many young, single moms lack access to quality education or job opportunities. Battling homelessness and poverty, their barriers to opportunity can be limited.

Bright Endeavors transforms their lives through a paid job training program, teaching them to craft premium soy candles. Lovely, fragrant candles are what they make, but the job skills they learn are universal.

Through guidance and job skills, the young moms learn what they need to secure and maintain quality employment, to begin working toward professional success.

The candles are made in four sizes, from $7.99 to $24.99. The two smaller sizes make great stocking stuffers.

There are 12 fragrances, including four holiday-specific ones:

four seasonal scents plus eight popular year-round options. For the holidays:

 
Sizes include:

 
Order yours at BrightEndeavors.org/shop.

[5] The smallest candle size, Mini Signature, burns for 12 hours. Shown here: Pumpkin Chai.

[2] Crown Royal Vanilla: blended Canadian whiskeys infused with the Madagascar Bourbon vanilla.

November 10th is National Vanilla Cupcake Day, and we have a purely adult celebration in mind:

Buy a cupcake and a miniature “airline” bottle of your favorite spirit (it’s 1.7 ounces).

Place the cupcake in a dish to catch any drippings. Remove the cap of the miniature and, holding your finger to prevent a deluge, turn the bottle upside down, pushing it into the cupcake.

You may want to eat your treat with a spoon or fork.

This idea comes from Crown Royal Vanilla. Bursting with vanilla flavor, it’s a perfect pairing for most cupcakes.

> National Cupcake Day (in Canada) is February 24th.

> National Chocolate Cupcake Day is October 18th.

> National Cupcake Day is December 5th.

> The history of cupcakes.
 
 
CAN’T GET ANY MINI CUPCAKES?

Can’t get to the liquor store to buy minis? The store has no mini flavors you want?

Here’s a workaround:

 
 
CUPCAKE & SPIRITS PAIRINGS

Use your palate—and the spirits you have—to create different pairings. Some suggestions:

If straight alcohol is too strong for you, dilute it with some water.

Or, if you like things sweet, make a sugar syrup by heating equal parts sugar and water until the sugar dissolves. Then mix in the spirit to your desired flavor intensity.
 
 
PARTY IDEA

Have a boozy cupcake party.

Put all the ingredients on a table:

 
Encourage everyone to create a DIY celebratory cupcake.

You can also provide extra bowls of frosting for the frosting fans.

MORE BOOZY CUPCAKES

If you like the idea of boozy cupcakes, here are 21 recipes to make “cocktail cupcakes”—from Cosmopolitan to Margarita.
 
 

So goes a line from the immortal poem, “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” more commonly known as “The Night Before Christmas.”*

Yet how many of us have recited or sung that line without knowing exactly what a sugar plum was?

No matter what today’s confectioners sell as sugar plums—purple, plum-flavored, gumdrops and gummy candies are among them—here’s the real story.
 
 
THE HISTORY OF SUGAR PLUMS

Let’s start with the fact that sugar plums are not plums coated in sugar. And that they are descended from comfits: seeds and other small centers that were sugar-coated through the technique known as sugar panning.

In fact, the predecessors of sugar plums contained no fruit, but were instead hardened sugar balls with a seed, nut, or spice inside.

They began as medieval comfits (the French word is dragées, drah-ZHAY), confectionery consisting of dried fruits, nuts, seeds or spices coated with layers. They are known as pastilles in the U.S. (or sometimes, they’re called pastels, an erroneous reference to the colored sugar).

The confections were (and are) made by coating a small seed—anise, caraway, coriander, fennel—or diced ginger—with melted sugar (photo #1). Licorice pastilles (photo #2) were also popular—the forerunners of Good & Plenty.

Almond comfits, also known as sugar almonds or Jordan almonds†, became popular favors for guests at baptisms and weddings.

In the Middle Ages, all of these candies were coated in plain white sugar. The rainbow of colors came later.

Small aniseed (and other) comfits evolved into larger aniseed balls, also sugar-coated. They were later joined by balls of spiced dried fruits and nuts fruits…which became known as sugar plums (photos #3 and #4).
 
 
WHY CALL THEM “PLUMS?”

The term sugar plum came into general usage in the 1600s. “Plum” referred to the small size and spherical or oval shape of the confection.

Before technology mechanized the process, the seeds and other centers were coated in a pan by adding layer by layer of melted sugar to build up the hard shell. It was a slow and labor-intensive process, and often took several days.

Thus, these little candies were “luxury products.” It took a significant effort to make at home, and they were not inexpensive to purchase from the confectioner. (In fact, in the 18th century, the word “plum” became British slang for a large pile of money or a bribe [source].)

By the 1860s, the Industrial Revolution engendered manufacturing with steam heat and mechanized rotating pans, comfits were now affordable for mass consumption.
 
 
CONTINUE THE TRADITION

It’s not no more difficult to make sugar plums than to make cookies from scratch.

Here are two recipes for starters. There are many more online.

And if your sugar plums are for adults only, consider adding a splash of liqueur or brandy.

[2] Pastilles is a modern word for comfits. They’re most often found these days as licorice pastilles. Good & Plenty candy is a larger-size (photo courtesy Jet.com).

[3] Comfits engendered sugar plums, sweet balls of dried fruits, nuts and spices; here, apricots, dates, prunes and walnuts (here’s the recipe from Savory Moments Blog).

[4] This sugar plums recipe has figs, pistachios and cocoa powder. Here’s the recipe from Katie At The Kitchen Door.

*Also called ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas” from its first line, the poem was first published anonymously in 1823 and much later attributed to Clement Clarke Moore, who claimed authorship in 1837. Modern scholars now attribute the poem to Henry Livingston, Jr., a Poughkeepsie army major and landholder (1748–1828).

†English speakers call these sugar-coated almonds Jordan almonds, but they come from Spain. The word is a corruption of the French word for garden, jardin (zhar-DAN), which refers to the particular large variety of almond.
  

[1] Pouring the hot, foamed milk into the espresso (photo © Olesyk | Pinterest).

[2] A standard cappuccino (photo courtesy Truvia | Erika Dodge).

[3] Nespresso Aeroccino Milk Frother, an electric frother (photo courtesy Williams-Sonoma).

[4] Aerolatte milk frother wand, a battery-operated frother (photo courtesy Williams-Sonoma).

[5] Latte doesn’t have the added foam of cappuccino, which is why baristas can make the latte art (photo © 3 Bros Cookies).

November 8th is National Cappuccino Day, a beverage that has been widely known in the U.S. only since the 1990s.
 
 
THE COMPONENTS OF CAPPUCCINO

Cappuccino is an espresso-based drink topped with hot milk and milk foam (photo #1). Sometimes there is a sprinkle of cinnamon or cocoa powder.

Because of the technology needed to make the espresso and foam the milk, cappuccino is not an ancient drink: It is little more than hundred years old.

Before there was cappuccino, there had to be espresso.

While modern coffee culture has been around since the 15th century (the history of coffee), it took a few more centuries for espresso to appear.

The espresso coffee machine was invented in Italy; the first patent was filed by Luigi Bezzera in 1901.

Espresso grew in popularity, and improvements were made to the original machines. The machines were complicated and bulky, thus limited to cafés with trained baristi. Sitting at a café, conversing or reading with an espresso, cappuccino or latte, became a leisure activity.

The first record of the term “cappuccino” dates to the 1930s [source].

It seems to have been served Viennese style, topped with whipped cream and cinnamon or chocolate shavings.

After World War II, the development of better and more widely-available espresso machines created a thick crema on the top of the espresso (which was and is drunk black). From there, a the leap to foamed milk occurred.

The stage was set for the modern cappuccino, a base of espresso and crema, topped with one-third steamed and frothed milk, in a steam-heated porcelain cup (photo #2).

Espresso machines were developed with built-in steam arms to easily steam and froth milk in small pitchers. Today, with improvements in technology, every home with $100 to spare can have a basic espresso machine with a frothing arm.
 
 
CAPPUCCINO: A BREAKFAST DRINK

In Italy, cappuccino is traditionally a breakfast drink, often eaten with a croissant or a breakfast pastry. Casually, it is referred to as cah-POOCH, as in un cappuch, per favore.

Generally, Italians do not drink cappuccino after 11 a.m. But beyond Italy, anything goes. We personally enjoy cappuccino as comfort food whenever we want milky, foamy coffee. On some diet days, we can drink three or four!

Since that can be a pricey habit at coffee bars, we have a Nespresso espresso machine.

We also have a separate milk frother from Nespresso, called the Aeroccino (photo #3). For a modest investment, there are simple frothing wands from Aerolatte (photo #4) and other manufacturers.
 
 
CAPPUCCINO COMES TO AMERICA
While cappuccino spread throughout Europe, Australia, South Africa, South America, it was limited to the more cosmopolitan regions of North America in the 1970s and 1980s, until the mid-1990s.

Then, coffee bars began to spring up everywhere, serving espresso, cappuccino, latte and other Italian coffee-based drinks and espresso-based drinks.
 
 
HOW CAPPUCCINO GOT ITS NAME

Cappuccino takes its name from the order of Franciscan Friars Minors, nicknamed “cappuccini” (Capuchin monks) from their hooded frocks (cappuccio means hood in Italian, but it is particular the reddish-brown color of the frock that engendered the name).

There is a myth that a 17th century Capuchin monk, Marco d’Aviano, invented cappuccino after the Battle of Vienna in 1683, and that it was named after him.

This is as much a myth as the invention of the croissant to honor Viennese victory in that same battle (history of the croissant). Both croissant and cappuccino are 20th century creations.
 
 
CAPPUCCINO-LATTE DIFFERENCE

Latte is different from cappuccino, based on the amount of milk.

In our family, one of the greatest social sins is to run out of food.

This year, we’re using this servings planner from Whole Foods Markets.

Just enter the number of guests, and the tool will calculate how much you should serve.

Whatever you’ve making, just put in the number of people and it will tell you how much you need in:

How much of everything do you really need (photo 1ThanksgivingDay)?