Christmas Morning: Hors D'eouvres Party

My grandpa has 8 siblings. They each got married and had kids, and their kids all had kids. This massive family gets together every year on Christmas morning for a laid-back little shindig in Burlington, Ontario.

I just love the atmosphere. People mingle around the room, chatting and catching up. And I've heard it said multiple times that if you bother to bring a boyfriend or girlfriend to Burlington, it had better be a serious relationship, because otherwise what's the point of overwhelming them with so many relatives!* It's a truly, truly crowded party.

Tinsel! I just love it.

But aside from seeing all my great aunts and uncles, one of the things I like about the Burlington party is the creative food. It's all finger-food, and it's all insanely rich. I was able to snap a few photos after the crowd had cleared.

This year, someone brought brie with what I think was a sundried tomato spread on top. It was phenomenal with some wheat crackers. Behind are pinwheel sandwiches - I think that'd be a great little bento treat. They're very colorful, light and fun, but the creamcheese gives it a hint of protein so they're substantive too.

The pigs-in-a-blanket are a mainstay of the Burlington party. They're there every year, and they go SO FAST (there was only one left for the photo!) I'll admit, they're a bit pork-heavy for me, but I have one every year anyway. It's a guilty pleasure.

The little sign next to this one said "marinated goat cheese" and I thought it was my aunt's recipe, which calls for a variety of olives, but this seemed to be more herb and onion-heavy. It was a nice combination.

Oh, I honestly don't remember. I believe it was a salmon spread? Either way, it was delicious. And the chives are a lovely garnish.

Someone made a variety of little pastries that were to die for. Some had pork, some had spinach. They were all very delicate and very rich. I need to learn to make a flakey pastry crust like this so I can make little turnovers: again, perfect for bentos. This meal is full of lunch inspiration!

This is a mere SAMPLING of the desserts that were there.

Like I said, it's supposedly a light meal because it's all finger-food, but this is not a meal to mess with. Very rich, very heavy... pretty much 100% "guilty pleasure" territory.


*Yes, Brandon has been to Burlington. ;-)

Apparently Christmas Happened!

Wow. Funny thing about January: it flies by. We got back from break and we have both just been swamped with work. I'm sorry for the super-delayed update. So, now that we're halfway through January... who wants to talk about Christmas dinner? Anyone? No one? Too bad, it's all I've got.

When I go home for holidays, I often take photos of friends and family, only to get back and remember that people don't like me posting photos of them on the internet. This year, I made sure to take some pictures of the food and decor, too, so I'd have something to blog about.

When my mom and I arrived in Kitchener/Waterloo, I saw what I feared might be the only snow I was going to experience all break long. So I asked my mom to take a picture of me outside.

As you can see, it's so warm out I didn't even need a jacket. So naturally, you can understand my concern that this would be my only snow of the season. Shortly after this photo was taken, we jumped in the car and drove to Toronto, where we did our Christmas Eve celebration with my extended family.

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My mom asked me to help with the apple pies, which we brought with us. I can easily say this was the best pie crust I've ever made. I don't even know what I did differently, it was just serendipitous. I'll try to recreate it so I can take photos for you guys, but I can't make any promises!

My uncle's dog is named Angel, so my cousins decided she should have an appropriate costume for the party. 

I tried to get a picture of dinner before the crowd got to it, but i was a bit too late. My aunt's turkey gravy was phenomenal: it was dark, rich and heavily seasoned. I sent her an email to ask what the secret is, she said white wine and fresh thyme. I'm officially adding it to my list of things to try!

I tend to geek out about the fact that we have a mixed family (I think I'm the only one who does), and I was in charge of bringing napkins, so I decided to have some fun with it. 

It was a really hectic, fun party. One of my groups of cousins is a set of triplets, and they're 4 years old this year. Things are always busy, busy when they're around!

We actually had two more parties on Christmas weekend that I want to tell you about; the party on Christmas morning is an annual tradition with my extended-extended family and there are some inventive snacks and desserts there that I want to show you! So that'll be next time. Take care. 

Holiday Fun in Texas

I spent the final week before Christmas finishing up my labwork, cleaning my apartment, and packing. But there was also some holiday cheer, as well!

Rasika and I decorated the lab door for the annual door-decorating competition, and we won! The prize was a box of chocolate truffles. We shared them with the whole lab. Our door was called "Merry Mito-Christmas" because our lab studies mitochondria. We made a wreath out of green mitochondria, and put up ribbons made from the electron transport chain.

We had two days of Channukah in Texas before I left to spend Christmas in Toronto with my family. We almost forgot to do latkes! But one evening Brandon came home from work with some potatoes and applesauce. I was THRILLED. I went around telling everyone my boyfriend had bought me "a lovely bouquet of potatoes." No one got the joke but me, but that's okay, I still liked it. ^_^

So, we had Rasika over, and we lit the menorah and ate latkes. I explained how to play dreidel, but Rasika said if we played I would cheat by reading the letters wrong! She's a goof.

Showing off my mad Dreidel skillz.

It was really nice to have a proper Channukah before I took off for the chaos of Christmas/New Years madness. I'll do another holiday update after the New Year, when I'm back in Texas. Have a lovely holiday, everyone!

Baking, as Always!

My mom had her baking marathon, so I had mine!

I sent cookie tins filled with goodies to several of my friends this year. Here are the action shots:

I did a recipe called "Gary's Favorite Cookies." It's a family recipe, they're oatmeal/walnut/chocolate chip. My mom thinks I make them wrong, because hers spread out super thin, and mine are like tiny cookie clumps.

I also did blonde brownies, which turned particularly golden this time around.

And I made a banana loaf for my brother, who can't eat anything overly sweet. So I thought this would be a nice middle-ground.

I started doing my own baking projects at Christmas-time a couple of years ago. My mom has criticized my holiday baking. She feels that cookies for the holidays have to be fancy. She says, holiday cookies require an extra step, like rolling, cutting, icing... something special. She says that blonde brownies and Gary's Favorite Cookies are every-day recipes, and are therefore inappropriate for the holidays.

Do you guys agree? Is there a two-tiered system for cookies? Should we only cook "fancy" foods on the holidays? Or is my mother being adorably snooty? ^_^
Answer in the comments section!

Thanksgiving

This is, in large part, a food blog. And when I'm too busy to cook, I have nothing to post! But that doesn't mean I'm not eating awesome food. Here's a glimpse of my Thanksgiving weekend:

I flew home to be with my family.

My mom insisted that she get to taste my pie crust, so I helped with the apple pie.

Turkey, of course.

Lovely table settings

And never a shortage of dessert.

I took a lot more photos of family, but I don't think people want me posting pictures of their kids on the internet. Plus I know you guys are really here for the food, anyway. ^_^

My mom bakes about a billion different kinds of cookies for Christmas every year. It has become a tradition for Max and I to assist with the sugar cookies. We now use Thanksgiving weekend as our cookie marathon weekend:

It was a family visit whirlwind, and then I was off! Back to San Antonio...

Where a very special guy helped me prepare for the next big holiday:

<3

Halloween!

So, we planned a Halloween party. I made lots of themed snacks, and put together a last-minute costume.

I invited 5 people, and 4 bailed. So it ended up being me, Brandon and Rory hanging out with WAY TOO MUCH FOOD. But it's okay, I needed a laid-back evening. It turned out to be really relaxing.

Photo dump!

I dressed as a 1950's housewife.

We went to the store in the middle of the day, but I didn't break character!

Foods!

Hot spiced apple cider with rum! 

Happy Halloween!