Drop-off delights: Three ways to spread love

Each holiday season, the Passage's windows contain homemade gifts that you might bring to a dinner party or open house.  That went well up until now.  Obviously few of us are plunging our hand into a bowl of Sugar and Spice Candied Nuts while we watch "A Christmas Carol" with beloved friends. (If you live somewhere where this time-warp operates, I'm jealous.)

Plan A: Drop off dinner

Drive or walk over with a jar of something that's a meal: homemade pasta sauce and a package of pasta would be my first choice, because there are versions for many diets. 

 

Clockwise from upper left: Miso soup (any hearty soup counts as a meal, and you can add bread or rice cakes); ratatouille (give with baking potatoes or rice); Thai curry (give with rice) and pasta sauce. Not everyone has pasta on hand so I like to add a package.

Other ideas for main courses that travel and reheat well: chili, meat or nut loaf, quiche, or a baked pasta like ravioli. Put that in a box or bag lined with colourful tissue paper, and if you want to go all out, sprinkle the whole deal with dollar-store paper confetti. Optional: add cookies or fruit.

Plan B: A sumptous snack

Folks are doing serious movie-watching, so this decadent popcorn will thrill. You can have fun making it with kids, but watch out because they tend to eat as they cook, messing with the yield.

Dark Chocolate Caramel Popcorn, aka Moose Munch, is courtesy of Erin Browne's blog, Brownie Bites. The original Moose Munch is a Harry & David product; a tin is upwards of $40, plus the shipping—so make your own. 

Photo: Brownie Bites  

I like a dark chocolate drizzle, but milk is excellent too, and do increase the caramel by 50% like Erin says, so you can sample it (and also because this is a gift.) The mix is best eaten within a day of making, but only worry about getting it to them in that window and they'll do the rest.

Here is a popcorn mix made with ingredients that include cocoa, collagen whey, raw almonds and raw honey; while my family can't resist real butterscotch, your loved ones might enjoy this version.  

Plan C: Your personal specialty, from pickles to pudding

Mary Berry's Christmas Pudding 

I am shamelessly hinting for a hunk of Alyson's Christmas pudding, which is like no other, unctuous but almost airy. I deeply want her to cut the person who did not say thank you last year and give his portion to me. She actually proposed the idea. 

The photo shows Mary Berry's pudding, which is fairly easy and unlike Alyson's mother's recipe, does not require suet— but both are sent into full-tilt lusciousness with the brandy or rum butter.  (You will need a pudding basin, but a Pyrex bowl will also work.)

We have carol-sings and seders on Zoom now, but delivery of your much-loved specialty seems to place you among them. It hearkens back to a time when "just drop by" was not a fraught proposition, and ahead to a more normal future.

How closely you can commune with those receiving these gifts depends on  the public health guidelines where you live and the preferences of the recipient. 

We received a drop-off delight this past weekend, when Carroll and Michael dropped off a box of homemade goodies and an evergreen wreath.  One of the gifts vanished almost immediately and the other will remind us of their kindness for weeks.

Meanwhile, our city promises to unveil "ways to get more Montréalers outdoors this winter". I'll let you know how that goes, but I already have my best parka ready.