Oh...it sounds so fancy, but it's super easy. Just blend all ingredients in the blender and let it sit for awhile, then blend again and pour into hot muffin tins that have been coated with the beef fat and drippings from the roast. They're done in just a few minutes in the oven.

Ohh...deviled eggs. I think that my dau is bringing some of those. Her husband has a new request for making deviled eggs...put a small strip of anchovy as a garnish. I had never heard of that before. He was at someone's house who did that. He normally doesn't like anchovies, but he loved that little salty hint.

When I make deviled eggs, I buy the eggs pre boiled and peeled. Saves me a lot of time.

An annual tradition at our house is the Christmas Day 7-course Italian dinner for “orphans and Jews and Buddhists and aethiests and Muslims and Hindus and christians and anyone else who wants to come”. This year it is just my husband and I. Maybe one other couple.

We make everything from scratch. Our companions are only required to bring an apetite and if they want to, a nice bottle of wine, or sparkling juice or anything else they want to drink and share.

They are not allowed to help us clean up. A very strict rule!

This has been my husband's tradition for 50 years. I have been part of this tradition for 20 of those years.



This year, a smaller version of previous years:

Small Antipasta Plate with homemade baguette.

Grilled proscuitto-wrapped shrimp

Roasted broccolii and proscuitto with balsamic glaze (husband doesn't like brussel sprouts and we have a lot of proscuitto)

Ricotta Gnocchi with a Browned Butter Sage sauce – with homemade ricotta cheese

Calabrian Sausage and Rapini Ravioli – the sausage is homemade, the rapini is from our garden and the pasta is homemade

Lamb Ragu with Pappardelle – with homemade, hand-cut pasta

Panna Cotta with Blueberries – blueberries are from our garden

Anginetti – Italian Lemon Drop cookies

Dark chocolate truffles

Dessert is served with a small glass of Port, Lemoncello and coffee..




Happy Holidays!

wow! happy holidays to you, too.

We had for 5 people:
Shrimp skewers, BBQ salmon (orange/ginger sauce), BBQ roast beef
Sweet potatoes
Corn pudding
Home made croissants
Pumpkin pie

Also, pickled okra, dill and sweeet pickles, cheese crackers, cream cheese/sweet pepper relish

It's like we all contributed what food we like best and mostly naustalgic.

Very interesting combination.

It's Florida, sat outside. Our new home state. What a contrast to the flooding that's happening in California, our previous home.

This was first Christmas as widow.

We had Christmas at the DD's yesterday. It was an eventful 2.5 hour drive, with high winds, blowing snow, ice pellets, literally, a set of tire tracks to follow in each direction, and lots of impatient stupid drivers.

There were so many munchies that we could probably have done without the main meal, but the spiral cut ham, hulupchi (cabbage rolls) and sides were delicious! As predicted, there were three kinds of pies for dessert.

The 1.75 hour drive home today, was like we were on a different planet. No snow or freezing rain, roads were dry and clear, and traffic was definitely less insane.