Grandma's Christmas Trees, Attempt #1

First try right on the counter... Was a challenge to move!

Between recollections Hubby and I drew from together, then with confirmation from my mom, I had a good idea of how Grandma shaped her famous Christmas trees we ate every year for Christmas morning breakfast.  

Wider than it is high, crosswise
across cookie sheet

The key is to roll a rectangle of yeast dough, then bring the top corners down to meet in the center bottom, forming the triangle.  







Mom said Grandma used a separate piece for the trunk, but I found it easy to cut up from the bottom in 2 snips, one to each side of the center, then roll that section to form the trunk.

Then the 'branches' are formed by snipping in toward the center along the sides of the triangle, then twisting each section slightly, so that the branches separate a bit, like I did in the wreaths last week.  

After raising 1 hour

I filled the wreaths with brown sugar, cinnamon, and candied fruit.  It was toooo sweet.  Inside these trees, I used brown sugar, cinnamon, and raisins, so more like cinnamon rolls.  (Of course we had to do the requisite taste-testing!) But I still felt this wasn't right... The raisins bunched together, and were loose when the tree was cut.  Something was missing/not right.  




In an email conversation with my older sister, we determined that Grandma incorporated the candied fruit into the dough, so the sweetness was spread throughout, and the colorful fruit served as ornaments on the tree.  I will try that next...  

I recommend forming and baking on parchment, so easier to move around