Sandwich-cookie recipe passed down through generations

Heather Penno’s date-filled cookies have a long matrilineal history.

Her great-grandmother made this tender sandwich cookie filled with jammy dates a Christmas tradition and passed the recipe on to her eldest daughter.

“I always remember my grandmother having a dainty tray and this was definitely on it,” Penno says, adding the cookies only ever make an appearance during the holidays.

The tradition of seasonal baking and bequeathing has continued, with the recipe passed down to the eldest daughter of each subsequent generation.

Eat and greet

The next dozen issues of the Free Press are going to be high in sugar content and sentimentality.

Our annual Homemade Holidays series kicks off Tuesday and features 12 festive dessert recipes published over 12 days. The goal is to highlight family traditions, while providing readers with inspiration for their own holiday baking adventures.

Past editions have included vintage treats from the Free Press’s archives, reader-submitted recipes and staff favourites.

This year’s batch showcases the connective power of cookies.

During World Vegan Month, vegans across generations share their reasons for embracing the lifestyle

November is World Vegan Month, an event celebrated worldwide to shine a light on what it means to be vegan.

The U.K.-based Vegan Society defines veganism as: “a philosophy and way of living which seeks to exclude — as far as is possible and practicable — all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose; and by extension, promotes the development and use of animal-free alternatives for the benefit of animals, humans and the environment.”

In other words, vegans are fully plant-powered.

While veganism was once considered an option from the fringes, it’s now much better recognized, discussed and practiced by old and young, famous and not.

Chronicle of Canada’s maple-syrup industry a sweet treat

The story of Canadian maple syrup is full of unsavoury characters: malicious colonizers, conniving capitalists, brazen thieves.

In Maple Syrup: A Short History of Canada’s Sweetest Obsession, author Peter Kuitenbrouwer draws on this rich well of personalities to create an informative, entertaining account of one of the country’s most iconic natural resources.

It’s a story Kuitenbrouwer is uniquely positioned to tell.

A longtime journalist and former National Post columnist, Kuitenbrouwer grew up tending a sugar maple bush with his family in rural Quebec. Tapping trees and boiling sap was a stabilizing annual tradition following a chaotic early childhood. He’s now a registered forester with his own small-scale syrup operation outside of Toronto.

The trail of sweet treats from Hansel & Gretel has come to life in Winnipeg — in a much less sinister way.

● Take a self-guided tour of five local bakeries and cafés to sample special Hansel & Gretel-themed goodies ahead of opening night for the Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s fairy-tale production, running Oct. 9-12.

● High Tea Bakery (2103 Portage Ave.) has created a set of 12 mini imperial cookies emblazoned with photos from the production. Visit highteabakery.com to pre-order.

● Jenna Rae Cakes is serving gingerbread macarons with icing and sprinkles at its locations at The Forks, Academy Road and Island Shore Boulevard.

Bar Accanto chef off to finals of Canada’s Great Kitchen Party

Emily Butcher, executive chef of Bar Accanto and Nola in St. Boniface, snagged the top podium spot at Wednesday’s regional leg of the national culinary competition Canada’s Great Kitchen Party.

Butcher, 35, who moved to Winnipeg from Vancouver 10 years ago, scored top marks in the six categories — visual, texture, taste, technical, beverage compatibility and wow factor — on which all eight competing plates were judged.

The 2025 gold medallist’s dish of smoked duck and squash dumpling, massaman curry, fermented kohlrabi salad with black pepper glazed octopus, leche de tigre, pickled eggplant and toasted peanut was inspired by the Prairie landscape and rooted in her West Coast upbringing and Chinese heritage.

This is the second gold medal for Butcher after her 2019 regional win, which led her to compete in the 2020 nationals, where she took bronze.

Local chefs heat up culinary competition

Seven local chefs have thrown their hats in the ring for a chance to represent Winnipeg at the 2026 Canadian Culinary Championship in Ottawa January next year.

Also known as Canada’s Great Kitchen Party, the regional qualifier takes place on Wednesday, Oct. 1, at the RBC Convention Centre, and features entertainment from Spirit of the West’s Geoff Kelly, as well as Canadian musicians Barney Bentall, Kevin Fox, Matthew Harder and Rebecca Harder.

Chefs Emily Butcher (Bar Accanto), Darnell Banman (Thermea Spa Village), Michael de Groot (Gather Craft Kitchen & Bar), Ken Hoang (Le Colonial Restaurant and Bar), Norman Pastorin, (Basta! Filipino Kitchen), Chinnie Ramos (Wow! Catering) and Lauren Wiebe-Dembowski (Niakwa Country Club) will be judged on skill, creativity and technique as they vie to impress the panel of local culinary experts, led by head national judge Chris Johns, 2025 regional winner Austin Granados (formerly of Cake-ology) and Winnipeg senior judge Mike Green.

“We’re honoured to have such a strong field of chefs representing Winnipeg this year,” said Green.

Egg-venturous

Karl Oman is something of an egg-vangelist.

“I think people underestimate the egg,” says the chef and culinary arts instructor. “Eggs are the best thing ever; they’re like nature’s wonder — eggs are the cheapest protein you can buy, eggs have all your vitamins, except vitamin C, and eggs have all nine amino acids.”

After a career in hotel kitchens, Oman landed a faculty position at Red River College Polytechnic, his alma mater, in 2006. His favourite part of the job is seeing first-year culinary students gain new skills and greater appreciation for food — something he’s been fascinated by since childhood.

“I always wanted to cook. Food brings people together in all situations. Whether it’s a celebration or a sad time, nourishment and hospitality bring people together,” he says.

Plant-based love

Brittany Martens and Caitlin Sikora are business owners and trailblazers on a mission.

Since last year they’ve been putting in the time, the work and the commitment to create Herbivore Haven, a large-scale vegan market. Now they’re riding high on their labour of love and working on the next chapter.

The two creative innovators have been fully immersed in building on Herbivore Haven’s success. With strengths that work perfectly together, the dynamic duo managed to create two hugely thriving market events so far and are already working on a third for early next year.

Interest in all things plant-based continues to grow and not only for those already living a vegan lifestyle.

Nutrition experts get to the meat of latest grocery store trend

Protein-fortified milk, pasta with added protein, high-protein tortilla chips. Turn down any grocery aisle these days and you’ll likely find a wide variety of products bulking up on a certain macronutrient.

Interest in protein isn’t new (see the popularity of the Atkins and keto diets), but social media has raised the essential nutrient to cure-all superfood status.

“We’re bombarded by this idea that we need to eat more protein to have more muscle and look better, and that is changing consumer behaviour,” says Dr. Dylan MacKay, an assistant professor in the department of food and human nutritional sciences and department of internal medicine at the University of Manitoba.

A 2024 survey of American adults found 71 per cent of respondents were trying to consume more protein, up from 59 per cent in 2022. The same survey determined exposure to food and nutrition content has increased significantly across social media platforms in recent years.

We try reader-submitted Jell-O recipes

Saturday is Eat Your Jell-O Day.

In honour of this gelatinous holiday, we’ve done just that.

Below you’ll find Homemade recipes for sweet and savoury gelatin dishes submitted by Free Press readers, along with tasting notes from myself and colleagues Ben Sigurdson and Jen Zoratti.

But first, a brief history of “America’s most famous dessert.”

Pucker up for this oh-so-sweet and easy lemon trifle

Homemade Holidays is back for another year of festive cookies, cakes and treats.

From now until Dec. 17, we’ll be sharing a sweet daily recipe to inspire your holiday baking. This year’s batch of 12 recipes include Free Press Favourites shared by newsroom staff and a selection of previously unpublished reader recipe submissions from our 2022 Homemade community cookbook project.

We’re kicking things off with an impressively easy trifle recipe from Free Press office manager extraordinaire Margaret McMillan. It’s light and fruity, making it an ideal end to a heavy holiday feast.