Happy Holidays! Let's microwave some sugar... Or maybe just buy some candy...

The holidays are coming! You want to make some candy, but all the recipes you find sound too intimidating, with their demands that you own a candy thermometer or at least understand the differences between soft ball, firm ball, and hard ball stages. No worries! Microwave Magic (produced by the staff of Farm Wife News, edited by Annette Gohlke, 1977) offers a couple of options.

If you really miss Thanksgiving (or just have a can or two of leftover cranberry sauce you want to get rid of), make some cranberry candy!

It's easy-- just microwave the sauce with extra sugar and a bunch of raspberry gelatin, flavor with a bit of raspberry extract, and let it stand in a buttered dish overnight before cutting and rolling in granulated sugar. Presto! Red candies for everybody.

If you're more of a chocolate type, go for Chocolate Igloos instead.

These are on the very outermost limbs of the Krispie Treats family tree-- chocolate chips melted and cooked with with sugar and water, then stirred into corn syrup, crispy rice, nuts, and vanilla. How does this large, brown blob become igloos? Drop tablespoonfuls onto waxed paper, and then roll them in confectioners sugar. They're sure to look as much like an igloo as a wad of chocolate Krispie Treats rolled in confectioners sugar! Just tell people they're supposed to be igloos, and they'll see it right away. Or at least pretend to, if they're nice.

And if all else fails, remember that homemade candy is overrated. Nothing tastes better than Reese's peanut butter trees anyway, even if they could just as convincingly be labeled Reese's peanut butter igloos. (You'd think a big company like that would be able to make at least semi-convincing holiday shapes!) Just go out and buy them. Whoever you're feeding will be just as happy.