I'm just going to wrap up 2015, introduce 2016 and get right to the recipes! My youngest son Dane came home from college for Christmas and that made the season more festive and lively. We went to a few parties, I baked lots of cookies and we made our deliveries driving all over the county two nights in a row. On Christmas Eve day we have had a tradition for years and years where we go to the movies during the day usually followed by a party at someone's house or even at our own. Once all the kids went away to college and came home for the break, we forewent the parties and started ordering Chinese or pizzas to bring home which would then be followed by games, more movies and then before bed, the animated story of Christ's birth called "A Savior Is Born". This year, Dan, Dane and I did this for Christmas Eve Day: we went out to breakfast at the Friendly Toast in downtown Portsmouth (delicious), then to Planet Fitness for a work out, after, went to a movie called "In The Heart Of the Sea" (we loved it), followed by Chinese food which we had ordered the day before so we could pick it up at 5:30 on our way home from the theatre. After dinner we sat around the TV and watched Christmas videos and songs on YouTube and mormon.org (our church website).
Our old neighbor's near the Yellow House.
On Christmas Day after we watched Dane open his gifts, we hosted a Brunch and the Soucys came over (Dan's daughter and family) as well as two young female missionaries from our church. I made homemade cinnamon rolls, a crockpot full of really good hot chocolate and Dan cooked up lots of scrambled eggs with cheese and vegetables. Then we all hung out for a while, went on a walk (it was sunny and mid 60s!) and after the missionaries left around 1 pm, the rest of us went to see Star Wars at the theatre in Methuen MA - great film! Afterwards, Dan, Dane and I headed home to eat Dan's killer lasagna and pull some English crackers (poppers?) our dear friend Kathryn W gave us. Here we are above in our crowns that came in our crackers along with little jokes and tiny gifts. We have enough left to do this again next year.
On the 27th, we three drove to NYC for a couple days of museums, Broadway, bakeries, Christmas lights and shop window displays.
I was so excited to revisit the gorgeous pale purple walls of the New York Public Library and was shocked to see them newly painted red!
We stood in a very long line ….
To go in to this tiny famous bakery, one of my faves - see the name on the glass? Levain Bakery, home of the incredible and humongous cookies that taste like a bakery cookie should. We wouldn't have waited in line since we have been there so many times but it was Dane's first experience with Levain so we did it for him and then split a warm cookie between us on the next block.
Ready to head out the door to go see this musical ...
It was wonderful!
We also waited in a very long line to get into the Guggenheim since the Met line went for blocks so we walked down the street and got in the shorter around the block line. Every museum we passed had ridiculously long lines?!
For breakfast before the museum going, we waited in another long line to eat at the famous Sarabeth's. It was so so so good! I had lemon ricotta pancakes with apricot stuffed pork sausage. The sausage came in a pool of marmalade. Look at the apricots in that sausage - marvelous!
On New Year's Day, Dane went off to Boston with friends and Dan and I hunkered down to watch the three original Star Wars movies. I made a pot of my award winning Chili and a batch of Junk In the Trunk cookies (recipe for cookies further below). And salad with a fabulous vinaigrette - so easy to make and wonderful (recipe below too!).
Cookie dough with tons of chocolate, potato chips, peanuts and pretzels.
I mixed these two flavors together in my saved Theatre cup. Yum!
Recipe for
Junk In the Trunk Cookies. I got this on the Today Show - as soon as I heard the name of the cookie I knew I had to make them immediately.
1 3/4 cups flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 sticks unsalted soft butter
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (Ghiradelli 60% are the best at the grocery store!)
1/2 cup crushed kettle cooked potato chips
1/2 cup chopped pretzels
12 malt balls (whoppers) cut in half (I used about 20)
1/3 cup salted peanuts
Sift the dry ingreds and set aside. Beat the butter, sugars, vanilla until creamy, add in the egg and vanilla. Pour in the dry ingreds and beat until barely blended in. Add all the goodies and mix together well. Chill dough for one hour. Cold dough bakes better for this recipe. Drop dough balls onto cookie sheets that are either parchment lined or greased. Bake 11 to 13 minutes until light golden brown. Eat many warm and freeze the extras because they are really good cold too!
Fresh Basil Vinaigrette. We got this recipe from a restaurant in the tiny town of Trinidad CA from the waitress. So good!
Take a couple very large handfuls of fresh basil (I used a plant I bought at the grocery store), a fat teaspoonful of jarred minced garlic (or several cloves of fresh), 1 cup extra virgin olive oil and 1/4 cup of either balsamic vinegar or red wine vinegar. Salt and pepper to taste. Blend in a blender until well emulsified. Keep in fridge after but let come to room temp before serving. Lasts several weeks chilled.
Finally we got our first snowfall December 29th! Just a few inches but enough to make it winter pretty.
Good bye 2015! Hello 2016! Tomorrow's blog post (yes I will do two in a row) will be about some more Before and After projects going on - several befores and two afters and then many more afters later on. Now go and make some cookies.
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