New Year's Eve - Get Ready!!!!

This may seem a tiny bit premature but all you foodies should be preparing for New Year's Eve. Noise makers? Check? Fancy or fun outfit? Check? Food? Drink? Uh oh, what to serve? What are you and your guests going to eat?



Hopefully not Christmas leftovers.



Today and tomorrow are the days when foodies all over the world should be stocking their fridges and pantries with party food and drink. Buy stuff that can keep, like pasta for hot dishes along with meats and frozen appetizers. If you decide to go the fresh route, then wake up very early on Wednesday morning and head over to your local grocer's. Fish , fruit and veggies should be served fresh. Go early if you;re buying a popular item like bananas, avocados or tomatoes otherwise you get the picked through rotty produce if you go later. You can buy tomatoes for sauce if you;re making it today to freeze for New Year's Eve. If you're planning on baking , then use today and tomorrow to do all that. Store in the pantry or front porch. Another thing to remember is stock up on breakfast items if you're having a large group staying overnight. Have plenty of eggs along with bacon and ham . You can use the bread from the party to make toast or French toast.

Buy your champagne and other spirits during these days as well. If you wait until the last minute, you'll wind up with a brand you may not like. Shop early and get what is needed. This also includes different kinds of seltzers and sodas for the designated drivers and non drinkers.Another good idea is to have one or two urns of strong coffee around to stop anyone from dozing off. If you're planning on a fancy brunch on New Year's Day, stock up on the orange and tangerine juice along with tomato juice. This way you can make plenty of mimosas and Bloody Marys to accompany brunch.

Be ready for the New Year with the right amount of food and drink. This way you can celebrate without the hassle of trying to get last minute goodies for your party.

Boxing Day Food Fun

Yesterday was Boxing Day in England or St Stephen's Day in the rest of Europe.It's an extension of the Christmas holiday started in the Middle Ages when the alms boxes were emptied on St Stephen's Day. Also in Victorian England servants were given their Christmas gifts the day after the holiday hence the term.



Celebrate a belated Boxing Day by having English treats. Pop open a few crackers (those favors filled with a lame joke, paper hat and toy) and settle down for some plum pudding or the sticky toffee kind. The first is mixture of dried fruit, mostly prunes, nuts and suet. It is usually made five weeks before Christmas and the youngest child is allowed to give the mix a stir fro good luck for luck. Spirits such as brandy or a dark rich ale is added for more flavor.It is then boiled or steamed in a basin and stored in a cool dry place. it is then steamed for a few more hours on the day that it's served , decorated with holly and doused with brandy.It is then ignited for a spectacular show at the dessert table. Sticky toffee pudding, , is a more quieter affair. This is basically a cake laden with dates and then drenched in a homemade toffee sauce. Some add fresh whipped cream as a side to offset the overly sugared taste. You can add some lemon zest to give it a bite. Mince pie, that lovely mix of sweet and suet is also made, usually in tartlet form these days

Candy is big in England during Christmas hols too. It's not unusual for kids to be chewing on wine gums, a jujube type candy with wine and champagne flavors (wines gums are an acquired taste for any Yank, trust me on this one). Chocolates, especially Cadbury's brand are also big . Kids receive chocolate Father Christmases and coins wrapped in gold foil.

Boxing Day and the days after are still gift giving and feasting days in the United Kingdom. Nothing celebrates the festive season like sweet pudding and melt in your mouth Cadbury chocolates

Celebrate The Foods of Kwanzaa

Kwanzaa starts today and runs for seven days. Here adults and children learn all about the principles of the holiday and about the Mazao, or the fall harvest , usually in October. Like the many African countries Kwanzza is rich in vegetable diversity.

How to celebrate the holiday. Start with joliff rice which is regular white rice cooked in chicken broth and seasoned with tomatoes and peppers. There are also yams and black eyed peas or hoppin' john. The first t is eaten plain and the second usually cooked with spiced meat Peanuts are also big in the Kwanzaa celebration and are usually served up in a spicy stew. Dessert is usually benne wafers, butter cookies made with sesame seeds. Sesame is a big crop along the western African coast.

Kwanzaa is a celebration of the seven principles that drive life. One is the celebration of the harvest and in turn of the good food that the lands brings to us.

Merry Christmas To All My Fellow Foodies

December 25th.


Merry Christmas. Enjoy this holy day and holiday with good food, family and friends and great foodie gifts. Enjoy your new Rachel Ray or Paula Deene cookbook or that new food processor. A favorite writer of mine (and the man who I always thank for introducing me to writing) Charles Dickens had written in his 1843 “Christmas Carol””Keep Christmas in your heart the year long.” Follow his words , today and always.

Liz

December 24th A Foodie's Christmas Eve

While I’m celebrating my German heritage and putting up the tree I’m wishing all my reader s out there a healthy and happy holiday Enjoy your Christmas, Hanukkah and/or Kwanzaa. Celebrate your heritage and your blessings with favorite foods and traditional dishes.


Liz

Last Minute Goodies

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and that’s when most foodies around the world will be settling down to a sumptuous meal. The problem is do you have what you need to prepare a holiday meal for tonight and tomorrow? If you’re shaking your head right now, then run to your grocery store.

You probably have your main dish along with the sides right now. Do you need anything else? Sea salt? Cracked pepper? These may seem like small things but they add oomph to such party foods as deviled eggs and vinaigrette. Do you have enough cream cheese for the stuffed celery? What About sprinkles for last minute baking? Or the chocolate sauce for the special edition peppermint ice cream? Is there enough cocoa and milk for Santa’s thank you snack? Is there enough egg nog and rum for your own midnight treat when you watch the services from Rome? Make sure you have this and also make sure your stores have these as well. A lot of supermarkets won’t stock up until the 26th or they’ll be closed. Buy everything today.


A good idea is to take stock of everything you’re going to cook and bake and then write a list of what you don’t; have. It makes that last minute grocery shopping easier and you can map out your shopping route when you’re driving over. Bring someone with you to help cut down on shopping time. Don’t quibble if the brand you want is out of stock. Substitute. While you’re at it buy extras of what goes quick, like rolls and soda. Remember to also stock up on breakfast items, like eggs and orange juice if you’re having people stay over.


Christmas is the time of last minute surprises. Don’t turn them into bad ones by being ill prepared in the kitchen. Have everything on hand for the next two days of holiday merriment and feasting. Consider it a gift to yourself and your family.

Holiday Candy Land

This is the season for not just presents but also for sweets as well. No matter what faiths we were brought up into, there was always candy during this time of year. There was chocolate. There was peppermint. There was always something that gave the holidays their extra sweetness.

It;s the candy more than anything that forms our most cherished memories. There was ribbon candy., one of my grandparents' earliest remembrances. This was simple strands of colored and flavored hard candy cut to resemble bunched up ribbons. It became one of my favorites as well. there's the Advent Calendar where you would open a date and a small chocolate would be waiting for you. The best gifts were the small bags of chocolate coins, used both as Hanukkah gelt and Christmas stocking stuffers. These were magical and you felt like you were special getting them (a funny story here. I gave these to my friend's daughter when she was four. Hillary didn't know you had to peel off the gold foil and ate them whole. In a split second Deb and I realize d what she had done and four seconds later I had spit covered coins in my hand. We undid the foil and Hillary had her first taste of holiday joy. She recovered nicely. She's 22 now and works in Tiffany's marketing department in Manhattan where she can buy real gold coins for herself) Another fun candy gift was the bubblegum coal where you chewed black gum and wound up with a black tongue. That and Droste's chocolate orange were the best stocking stuffers ever!

Nowadays every candy company has some Christmas tie in. There are Butterfinger bells and holiday Hershey kisses. Cadbury's and M&Ms have red , green and white coatings on their chocolates Even Godiva has joined in with their festive ballotins of bonbons. We have all sorts of neat candies for stockings and as present toppers.

This time of year is a veritable candy land for kids and adults alike. Not only do we receive neat gifts but also neat candy celebrating the season.