Christmas is a comin' and there is no stopping it! Do you feel stressed over the Christmas period? I know I do sometimes! So much to do so little time? As part of my Christmas Gifts From The Kitchen series I have a really quick and simply little gift to make up all in the matter of 10 minutes.

Simple, quick and SUPER DUPER easy and best of all you probably have all the ingredients in your pantry. The main star of this dish is almonds - who doesn't have almonds in their pantry?

What is Almond Dukkah? Dukkah is a dry mix of coarsely ground nuts, seeds and aromatic spices. The predominant ingredient is almonds (or you could use any type of nut really) which get roasted in the oven and then coarsely ground with a bunch of different spices - normally cumin, coriander and chilli among them.

While your almonds are roasting in the oven place all of your spices and sesame seeds into a small pan. I love my mini pan that my mum gave me a few years ago. It's awesome to roast nuts, spices and cook eggs for one in. Anyway while the almonds are roasting, dry fry your spices to bring out the flavours of the spices and to get rid of the raw spice taste. You probably only need to do this for about 30-40 seconds - basically until your kitchen smells like an Indian take-away! All pungent and spicy!

Remove from the stove and place into a bowl. Do not leave in the saucepan as it will continue to cook and you will end up with burnt spices! Yuck! Once the almonds have roasted and have cooled slightly place them into a food processor or blender and whizz for 15-20 seconds or until coarsely ground. Now if you look in the picture below - don't go as far as that. I went a tad to long and ended up near almond meal rather than a course grind. Anyway onwards and upwards with it! It wasn't going to affect the taste so I used it anyway!

Place the "coarsely" ground almonds into the same bowl as the roasted spices. Mix thoroughly to combine all of the ingredients. Try not to taste some - cos it tastes a little bit too good still warm! I then placed mine into a old jam jar that I have stored in my "recycle" jar cupboard. If you don't save your old condiment jars then you should. I re-use mine to put jams, relishes and sauces that I make at home with my garden produce or fill them up with things like this Dukkah to giveaway as gifts!

Cut some cute fabric out and place around the lid and secure with some string, add a nice rustic tag and you in the Christmas present giving business! I cut this tag out from an old music book that I picked up for a couple of dollars from a garage sale. I used the same book to make my cute birdy art frame. Still got heaps of pages left so we will see what else I can create with it!

Maybe on the back of the tag you could add some serving suggestions. This will help people know what to do with it and stop it sitting in the cupboard unused and going off. I would suggest serving it in a small dish alongside some crusty bread and good olive oil combined with balsamic vinegar.

To eat it you dip your bread into the olive-balsamic combination and then dip into the dukkah to coat the dipped section and then eat .... repeat if neccessary! The may be a little bit of double dipping going on so maybe only serve this with close friends or family! Ha

This would be great as part of an anti-pasto platter or cheese platter. A no fuss addition to any up and coming christmas party! Some other great idea's to use this dukkah is to sprinkle it over some cauliflower tossed in olive oil and roast it until tender OR even make your own fries and toss them in a little bit of this mixture as well! yummo.

I actually gave all these suggestions a go over the past week and they turned out really delicious! I will try and post the recipes in the coming weeks!

Spicy Almond Dukkah