Category Archives: Food

Happy New Year!

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We greeted the New Year with family last night, feasting on Roast Turkey, Mashed Potatoes, Spanish Green Beans, Baked Rigatoni, Cinnamon Rolls, Thick Hot Chocolate, Chilled Champagne, and ginger-scented Suman. The food was excellent, the fireworks short but spectacular, and the company wonderful.  I had so much fun, I lost my voice. I’ve been whispering all day.

For 2008, my resolutions are simple:

  1. Eat less junk food.
  2. Make Smitten Kitchen’s Red Velvet Cake.
  3. Participate in more Lasang Pinoy editions.
  4. Cook at home more, eat out less, and
  5. Spend more time outdoors, especially with the dogs.

Happy, Happy New Year to you!

Christmas Eats

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Merry Christmas, everyone! The husband and I spent an quiet eve alone, opening presents, feasting on chinese food, and having a Christmas movie marathon. But I’m not here to tell you about the tears I shed while watching It’s a Wonderful Life, I wanted to share with you all the holiday goodies we’ve been enjoying (too much!):

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
I mentioned previously that I would be baking these and giving them away to close friends and family. Each batch, of course, required a taste test… which we were more than happy to do! Never mind that our recipe, based loosely on Alton Brown’s The Chewy, is something we’ve perfected in the past.

Frozen Brazo de Mercedes
My best friend gifted us with a gigantic tray of this, one of the most decadent, delicious things I’ve ever put in my mouth. I know I should post the telephone number of where it came from, but I’m too lazy to go to the freezer and write it down. I will soon, though. You simply MUST try it. *UPDATE: The frozen brazo is from Ana’s Kitchen, telephone 852-8224.

Christmas Ham from Santis
I love ham, especially Santis ham, anytime of the year, but Christmas ham is somehow more special. Taken with some thinly sliced queso de bola, it’s a holiday must-eat for me.

Queso de Bola
I love having one (or two) of these shiny red balls around. For breakfast today, I grated some up and made giant cheese omelettes for us. Creamy, salty, and awesome.

I could go on, I suppose- listing every naughty treat we’ve received from well-meaning friends and neighbors (don’t you love having neighbors? I LOVE having neighbors!) this year, but I need to go have a cup of hot chocolate and watch Home Alone on DVD now. What goodies are you enjoying this season?

Home for Halloween

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Trick or Treat

We celebrated Halloween at home this year, watching the kids in costume come and go, and RUNNING OUT OF CANDY IN 45 MINUTES. I’m not kidding, 45 minutes is how long our 151 bags of candy lasted.

Some of the family came over to enjoy some smoked sausages, sauerkraut, and potato salad (all made by my superstar husband), red candied apples (made by me!), and keg of beer (that’s right, a whoooole kegger!)

Naturally, I forgot to photograph the food and drinks, but here’s some of the candy:Halloween Candy

and a photo of our staff, dressed up and ready to scare the neighborhood kids:

Halloween Staff

We’re still recovering.

Tokidoki Cake

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tokidoki cake
I am LOVING this right now- not only is it Tokidoki, it’s Le Sportsac- AND it’s a cake!

outside: tons of fondant to make the tokidoki figure (and a lot of toothpicks), and to create the bag. the hearts and crossbones were hand-piped by her assistant, claire, onto wax paper, then dried and applied to the cake with more royal icing. inside: eight layers of vanilla macadamia nut cake with buttercream and a generous lashing of grand marnier.
(via the scent of green bananas)

Cupcake Heaven

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Cupcakes by Sonja

We had to bring the husband’s iMac in for repairs at the lovely Apple Store yesterday, and thought we’d drop by Cupcakes by Sonja on our way home. The cupcakes, all eight that we bought, went quickly- so quickly that all I could photograph was the box they came in. But it’s a pretty box.

This was the second time we’ve had Sonja’s cupcakes, and have already chosen our favorites, which are:

Red Velvet Vixen. Traditional Southern Cake made with Belgian Cocoa and Cream cheese icing. My personal favorite. I will not share this, not even with my dear sweet husband.

Bunny Huggers Carrot Cake.  Very moist cake made with fresh carrots topped with cream cheese frosting. Okay, so I’m a sucker for cream cheese frosting- and for carrot cake, for that matter. This is nicely done, not too spicy.

Lemon Drop. Delicious vanilla cake smoothered in our signature lemon buttercream frosting. Tangy lemon, mmmm!

Read more about Cupcakes by Sonja at these blogs (external links):