Happy 4th of July!

Happy Indenpendence Day!

We're having an impromptu barbecue over here - I think there is literally ONE guest! Oh well, that's what we get to throwing together a part on Wednesday!

Happy Father's Day!

To my dad, and all the other dads in the family!

Dad and Lindsay.
Dad and I.

And to some of the other dads I know:

Popops, lost in the middle of the grandkids.
Kevin with Kara.
Paul, with Jack.
James, with Carol and the boys.
Ted, with Grandma.
Chris, with Pam, Joe and Katherine (in '92; I couldn't find a good recent picture).

Happy Mother's Day!

To all the moms I know! And here are some of my favorite ones (in random order except for the first one who is obviously my favorite!):

My mom! (And me, donning some horrific wigs last Christmas!)

Me and Grandma Ginger last Christmas.

Pam, last Christmas.

Kathi, with dad (who can't steal the spotlight til Father's Day), last Christmas.

Lori, last Christmas.

Grandma Aurora, last Christmas.

Carol, at her house in August 2006.

Willa, with Jack, Christmas 2006.

Happy Easter!

We're spending the day at Pam's with the Easter cake! (I'm pretty sure there's an egg hunt planned too...)

Now I'm off to find a good Easter dress!

Preparing for Easter... in 2001!

Since I haven't colored Easter eggs probably SINCE these pictures are taken, these will have to do as far as Easter prep pictures go. Here are Thomas and Robert in 2001, at ages almost 6 and 4 respectively, dying Easter eggs with me.

The Easter Cake!

Here's the cake for tomorrow's Easter festivities at Pam's:


I spent the morning preparing it - well, really about an hour because it's really easy to make. Here are some photos of the process.







Are you drooling yet?

Happy Valentine's Day!

Here's what I was doing last year around this time:

Stuck in the schoolyard helping my friend Jackie try to get her keys out of her locked, turned-on car! It was quite the adventure and a slightly depressing Valentine's Day turned into one that will be hard to top!


Trying to get the keys out!


Me in the snow!


My friends Michelle and Amanda in a snowball fight!

It really was quite the afternoon. We had the janitor trying to pry open Jackie's window with a hanger, the rest of us helping to push the staff's cars out of the snow (and falling in the process!), and a whole score of both helpful and not-so-helpful people!

New Year's Eve Fun!

Okay, so New Year's Eve was ten days ago and I'm only now getting the pictures up (though I'd guess that's a good average for most, but VERY poor for me!). We didn't take many, but goofed around with the camera on my work laptop.

Here are me, Emily and Colette (Jordan's girlfriend), playing with PhotoBooth before all the guests arrived.






We have no idea where Kara was during this photo session which is unfortunate, as I feel this is an activity she would have enjoyed. Oh well... perhaps next time!

Happy New Year's Eve!

Everyone's celebrating today! I remember the days of the New Year's Eve Slumber Parties...

Just something to think about...

"I do think New Year's resolutions can't technically be expected to begin on New Year's Day, don't you? Since, because it's an extension of New Year's Eve, smokers are already on a smoking roll and cannot be expected to stop abruptly on the stroke of midnight with so much nicotine in the system. Also dieting on New Year's Day isn't a good idea as you can't eat rationally but really need to be free to consume whatever is necessary, moment by moment, in order to ease your hangover. I think it would be much more sensible if resolutions began generally on January the second."

~Helen Fielding, Bridget Jones's Diary

Preparing for the New Year

Start thinking about the things you need to do for next year! It may sound silly, but I DO NOT want to start my new year with a messy kitchen, so I spent some time today cleaning it up. I also put together a food plan so I can stop eating all the junky crap from Christmas and eat healthier stuff again (oh yeah... I also put together an exercise plan that takes me through the first week of February as well)!

In the next three days, I will likely not want to have a messy house in any way shape or form for the New Year (for some reason my head feels much less muddled when the house is clean) and take on many organizing projects. I'd better - because my New Year is filled with extra work!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Though this is actually the LEAST celebrated of all our Christmas celebrations, it's still worth mentioning! We'll all be at Pam's later for - what else?? - more food!

Christmas Desserts, Post # 2

Okay, so this is actually, positively the last post of the day, as I'm going to go watch the deleted scenes on my new Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix DVD, but I wanted to get the pictures up of the other desserts. The first is the snowflake cake and the second is the grand marnier torte.




There will be more photos coming of our Christmas Eve festivities shortly - we have TONS of pictures, mostly due to a late evening surge of energy that involved wigs and hats and crazy family members so I need to weed through them all to get them into the photo gallery. I, of course, will feature some of our best looks with the wigs.

Christmas Desserts, Post # 1

As a follow up to my planned Christmas desserts, here's a picture of the Chocolate Peppermint Whipped Cream Tart I made for Sunday's Fake Christmas. As I speak, everyone upstairs is enjoying the Snowflake cake and the Grand Marnier Torte, and pictures will be up of those later on or tomorrow.



I took a picture of it on the little cabinet that we had it on all day. I was trying to make it look like an ad or something, but it just wasn't working! (I think it's the thermostat behind it that kills it!)

Merry Christmas Eve!

We expect the second round of celebrations to begin at about 2:00 today. I've already eaten too much chocolate and expect that will not get any better as the day goes on. Today should be just as much fun as yesterday and I'm sure there will be posts aplenty as the day goes on. I have a lot of baking projects to share and a lot of new pictures of the week have cropped up as a result of this holiday!

P.S. Will post pictures of last night (the fabulous snakeboarding was from this morning, though it was a result of Jack's gift from yesterday).

Happy Fake Christmas!

Or I guess I could say Happy Christmas Eve Eve or something like that. The festivities begin in just a little while, when I haul all my presents and desserts to Willa's house. Full report on the day - hopefully with pictures - will come this afternoon!

A Day of Baking

Well, it took pretty much all day, but I've finally finished the baking for the holidays! I made the cakes mentioned in my post a few days ago. Tomorrow's guests will be enjoying the Chocolate Peppermint Whipped Cream Tart and Grandma's Cheesecake (though now that I write this, I realize I still have to do the glaze for that!).

Monday's guests will have the Frozen Grand Marnier Torte with Dark Chocolate Crust and Spiced Cranberries as well as what I'm calling a "Snowflake Cake" (pictures to come once it's made!).

I'm looking forward to all the treats!

Newly Discovered Talent

Making cards! Well... technically it's not all that new as I can scrapbook, but it's something I haven't tried and I'm really pleased with the results. This one is a card for a friend from work - all in all I probably spent less than $1.00 on it when you really break down the cost.

Looks like another service that Pig & Pepper can offer someday!

Recipes: Christmas Desserts

The following are in my plans for Christmas desserts. The first is a Chocolate Peppermint Whipped Cream Tart (which will be made, along with Grandma's Famous Cheesecake recipe) for Fake Christmas on Sunday. The second is called Frozen Grand Marnier Torte with Cranberries and it is intended for Christmas Eve with mom's family on Monday. What will the Christmas dessert be? Who knows. I'm thinking a snowflake cake - basically my standard-issue chocolate cake recipe with a ice blue fondant on the top with snowflakes. We'll see how ambitious I am on Saturday when I do all the baking!

Both recipes from epicurious.com (my new favorite website!).

DARK CHOCOLATE AND PEPPERMINT WHIPPED CREAM TART



Crust
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, diced
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 1/2 teaspoons cold whole milk

Filling
1 1/4 cups whipping cream
1/4 cup light corn syrup
12 ounces bittersweet (not unsweetened) or semisweet chocolate, chopped
1 ounce unsweetened chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon coarsely crushed red–and–white–striped hard peppermint candies

Topping
3 1/2 cups chilled whipping cream
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 3/4 teaspoons peppermint extract
PreparationFor crust:Blend first 4 ingredients in processor. Add butter and vanilla; cut in using on/off turns until butter forms pea–size pieces. Add milk and blend in using on/off turns until mixture forms small moist clumps. Gather dough into ball; flatten into disk. Wrap dough in plastic; chill 1 hour.

Roll dough out between sheets of floured parchment to 12–inch round. Press dough onto bottom and up sides of 10–inch–diameter tart pan with removable bottom. Fold dough edges over and press to form thick sides. Using thumb, press dough around sides to extend crust 1/8 inch above edge of pan. Freeze 20 minutes.

Preheat oven to 350°F. Bake crust until brown, piercing bubbles with fork, about 30 minutes. Transfer to rack; cool.

For filling: Bring cream and corn syrup to simmer in medium saucepan; remove from heat. Add all chocolate; whisk until smooth. Cool 30 minutes. Pour filling into crust. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup candy. Chill until set, about 3 hours. Do ahead Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and keep refrigerated.

For topping: Using electric mixer, beat all ingredients in large bowl to stiff peaks. Spread 2 cups whipped cream over filling, mounding slightly in center. Spoon remaining whipped cream into 1 bottom corner of large resealable plastic bag. Twist at top; grasp top firmly. Using scissors, cut 3/4 inch off filled corner to form opening; turn bag so that 1 seam faces up. Pipe 2–inch–long ovals of whipped cream side by side around edge of tart. Pipe more ovals to form second ring inside first, then pipe ovals in center. Chill at least 30 minutes and up to 3 hours. Remove tart from pan; place on platter. Sprinkle top of tart with remaining 1 tablespoon crushed peppermint candies and serve.

*****

FROZEN GRAND MARNIER TORTE WITH DARK CHOCOLATE CRUST AND SPICED CRANBERRIES



Crust
1 9–ounce package chocolate wafer cookies
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
3 tablespoons sugar
7 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Filling
8 large egg yolks
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice

2 cups chilled heavy whipping cream
1/2 cup chilled sour cream
5 tablespoons Grand Marnier or other orange liqueur
3 tablespoons frozen orange juice concentrate, thawed
1 tablespoon grated orange peel

Topping
1/2 cup ruby Port
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup honey
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
5 cups fresh cranberries or frozen, partially thawed, divided

White chocolate curls (optional) PreparationFor crust: Finely grind cookies, chips, and sugar in processor. Add melted butter; blend until wet crumbs form. Set aside 1/2 cup crumb mixture. Press remaining crumb mixture onto bottom and 2 inches up sides of 9–inch–diameter springform pan with 2 3/4–inch–high sides.

For filling: Whisk first 3 ingredients in medium metal bowl. Set over saucepan of simmering water and whisk vigorously until candy thermometer registers 175°F, about 8 minutes. Remove bowl from over water. Add spices. Using mixer, beat until thick and cool, about 5 minutes.

Using electric mixer, beat whipping cream, sour cream, Grand Marnier, orange juice concentrate, and grated orange peel in large bowl until peaks form. Add egg yolk mixture and fold together. Pour 2/3 of filling into crust. Sprinkle with reserved 1/2 cup crumb mixture. Gently spoon remaining filling over. Cover; freeze overnight or up to 3 days.

For topping: Whisk Port and cornstarch in large skillet to blend. Add sugar, honey, and spices. Bring mixture to boil over high heat, stirring often. Add 3 cups cranberries; cook until mixture boils and cranberries begin to pop but still hold shape, about 5 minutes. Mix in remaining 2 cups cranberries. Chill topping at least 6 hours or overnight.

Release pan sides from torte. Transfer torte to platter. Spoon topping over filling. If desired, garnish torte with white chocolate curls.

Christmas Quiz of the Day!

Just thought I'd mention that it snowed last night - and is still snowing a little bit! Unfortunately, work won't be cancelled... Oh, well! It's still a sure sign of winter - and Christmas! Maybe - just maybe - we'll have a white Christmas this year.

You Are a Minimal Christmas Tree

You're not a total Scrooge, but you feel no need to go overboard at Christmas. Less is more, and your Christmas reflects refined quality.

What Christmas Tree Are You?

I just have to add that clearly that's not true... if this blog isn't going overboard for Christmas than I don't know what is! Though I do tend to like minimal when it comes to decorations - I don't like the house looking tacky!