Also retail background. I remember telling my boss in September that I was getting married just after Christmas. She, single, said she was thrilled for me and that i should cement all my plans before Thanksgiving because she would not tolerate a word about the event between then and Christmas. Ho, ho. ho…
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My husband’s family makes Poteca every Christmas. When I first started dating my husband we made 9-12 loaves on Christmas Eve morning. As people have moved away etc., we still make it in the days before Christmas. I think we only make 6 loaves now.
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The glaze on these looks like a nice way to dress these up. Powdered sugar glaze?
My grandmother used to make rolls filled with either walnut, poppyseed, or prune butter at Christmas. I may try my hand this year at one or more varieties.
The nut rolls we had always seemed on the dry side to me and I can imagine a glaze adding welcome oomph. Thanks for this inspiration!
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Husband’s family never added a glaze or icing but did brush the hot loaves with melted butter. I skip this step.
After the first day, we don’t eat the slices “straight”, but rather heated in a teflon frying pan but not toasted. This seems to bring out the flavor. Then…butter.
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The nut rolls we had were unadorned as well.
Money was super tight in our house when I was a child, so only margarine as a spread. Butter certainly would have changed my mind about nut rolls being too dry. 
If eaten on Christmas morning or after, it was also possible to enjoy a sliver of ham on top of your slice of nut roll. Not my thing as for some reason, I could never get enthused about Christmas ham.
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Well that really sucked @pilgrim! Je suis desolee. We had blackout periods where we couldn’t even ask for a day off unless it was a true emergency or if you were at death’s doorstep yourself. Same when I worked in customer service for a distribution center. August and September were the holy of the holiest.
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Lots of past food gifts. Pretty vinegars with herbs or chilis floating. They were probably more visually attractive maybe than tasty. I adore Harry & David pears. Only those, really not much else from there. I often will make a diy basket for cooks I know by going to a specialty food store and choosing a variety of spices, preserved things in jars, pastes, etc. that are shelf stable, at least until opened. I think we still have a jar of marmite I got my husband as part of such a basket several years ago! I adore candied smoked salmon, so feel free to send me some 
Someone got me a cheese otm once from Beecher’s, and while I thought the idea was great, I wasn’t crazy about the execution, wherein at least 1/2 of each delivery by weight (I think it was 6x/yr) was their own flagship cheese. It was nice to get it and sample it once. But obviously, there was not much room to sample new things because this one cheese took up so much bandwidth.
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We never made povitica, always bought it.
My sister’s church used to make it for Xmas.
I’m not sure if they still do, but she sure doesn’t send us any lately.
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Back in the 80s when we were “gentlemen farmers” we did a lot of canning. Gift baskets for family included, lye cured olives, Jalapeños en Escabeche, Jalapeño jelly, zucchini relish, dill pickles, curry pickles, gherkins and pickled Brussels sprouts.
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I like the sound of that (after I looked it up). Why no longer?
We ran out of money and had to go to work.
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Thanks for this. Husband’s family was Slovenian. Interestingly, the article called this a dessert. In his family, it was always breakfast food, albeit connected to holidays. Or maybe snacking with a glass of sweet wine.
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I was thinking gentleman farmer meant " mainly for pleasure rather than for profit or sustenance." I wondered if it was getting too expensive, even as a hobby.
Ouch! when doing it for a living.
We were doing it for pleasure, no income, hence we eventually had to find employment. Note the quotation marks, I used the term loosely.
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Such a helpful article you found that explains the variations and names of this baked good.
Another variation that I can add: My grandmother ground up cornflakes as an economical way to extend the walnut filling. She made dozens of rolls at holiday time!
ETA: My aunt also uses crushed vanilla wafers in her nut roll filling, in addition to the walnuts and cornflakes. Though I think I’ll probably just stick to walnuts without the extenders if I try making this.
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Okay, thanks. I sometimes wonder if this “hobby farming” is in fact, a very expensive hobby!
And in the context of gift giving, how to think about cost.
But I’m still doing it.
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Yup - powder sugar, milk, and a bit of vanilla extract.
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I’ve sent food baskets from Eataly, Zabar’s, Zingerman’s.
Zingerman’s offers a 3 part foodie surprise gift, which gives the recipient a box of something Zingerman’s chooses once a month for 3 months.
I’ve used Goldbelly to send Junior’s Cheesecake to California.
There’s a place in New Mexico that has chili gift baskets, and I sent one of those baskets to my uncle a few years ago.
I’ve also sent some American friends boxes of Canadian candies and chocolates.
I sometimes make my cousin a box full of local chocolates, spice blends and other treats.
For one secret Santa exchange, I filled a padded envelope with spices, salts, nougat, candies and other things from Kalustyan’s in NYC.
I’ve also sent macadamia gift sets and spice blends from Hawaii, and I’ve sent some foodie gifts (local honey and chocolates) from a post office in Montana.
I haven’t mailed anything I’ve made, mostly because I’m not that organized. I do give people who live in town cookie trays, with 2 or 3 types of cookies I’ve baked, some Xmases. Or nice bags of homemade party mix. I’m trying to stay off the sugar right now, so I might make some savoury baked goods this year, or party mix.
Does anyone have any recommendations for a gift basket for someone who is gluten-free due to celiac disease? Thanks for any ideas.
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Our family makes Greek sweets at Xmas, too. Our Xmas box, that a few family friends receive, tends to include karidopita (walnut cake), kourembiedes, walnut baklava and diples (fried dough drizzled with syrup and topped with walnuts. Cretan-style, which is a circular spiral -rose shaped rather than the flatter folded Peloponnesian style. This is the Greek equivalent to crostoli or angel wings, but topped with syrup instead of powdered sugar). If we have family visiting, we are likely to prepare a Galatoboureko.
If we don’t have time to make the sweets, I stop by one of the better Greek bakeries in Toronto, and purchase bite-size baklava, kourembiedes and melamakarona.
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A couple of years back, Mrs H’s Christmas present to me was a food hamper that she’d made up. Nice chocolate, olives, couple of jars of different game pate, some biscuits, etc. A lovely thought (and I did share with her, of course)
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