Friend's great Christmas Party

My very good friend Nadia held a great Christmas Party at her home over the weekend, and she wanted me to bring the rectangle cheesecake after she saw one in this blog, so I've decided to decorate it with the marshmalllow snowman.

I also baked my recent favorate, a chocolate pecan pie. Both of them are my favorites.

The holiday season traffic was pretty heavy, but we finally got there and as I walked into the house, the main table was filled with great looking tasty food!

The first ones came into my sight were beautiful main dishes, ham and salmon.

Then follows other good looking side dishes such as salads, special rice, and bite size quiches.

Chicken and sauces were great, and the whole table just looked so beautiful!

I was so proud of Nadia.

Another thing I really liked with this party was that the idea of the cool drink bar. So many different drinks with cute ice container with fresh cranberries.

Each glass had a real leaf with a ribbon so the guests could write their name with a sharpie to identify each other's glasses.

I would love to use this idea if I have my own party in the future! :)

There were about forty people at the party and everyone was having great time with great food and decoration. Kids were having fun, too.

For myself, I was really glad to see people enjoying my cakes because making people smile with my sweets make me happy!

Celebrating holidays with great friends is always enjoyable and precious. Cheers to a great party!

Happy holidays to everyone, and have a great rest of the year 2008!!!

Christmas Decoration Class

Holiday seasons!

This time, I taught how to decorate cupcakes and cookies with Christmas theme. We made two kinds of cupcakes, and decorated two kinds of cookies.

The flavors of the cupcakes were vanilla lemon and carrot cake. Both baked very well.

There weren't enough time to bake cookies in class, so I baked vanilla and gingerbread cookies the night before and took them to the class for decoration.

Since this was everyone's first time to decorate cookies and cupcakes, it took more time than I planned, but many of them turned out very cute, and the class was very fun.

The cream cheese frosting with the carrot cake tasted very good, and the cookies were so cute!!!

This would be a good class to have in different seasons with different themes, so I would love to held more of them in the future.

Happy holidays!!

Company Christmas Party

Aibo-kun's company Christmas Party was held over the weekend, so we attended the party for the second time. When we attended the last year's party, it was right after I moved to CA and didn't know anyone, but this time, I could see a few people I know, so it was more relaxing and fun.

Here are the photos of the dinner served.


Blue cheese and pear salad. Since Aibo-kun cannot eat cheese, he got the one without cheese. (Thanks to the server!)

The main course was beef and white fish. The beef was cooked with red wine sauce, and the white fish was served with beurre blanc sauce. Accompanied with potatos, mini suqash, and other vegetables.

Dessert was key lime pie with coffee or tea.

The party was very simple, but it was nice to talk with other people, and have a holiday photo taken by the professionals.

Because of the slow economy, many companies have stopped having holiday parties, but I hope things will get better so people can share a happy time together again.

Appetizer & Hordorve Lesson

There was a request for fancy looking appetizers and Hordorves lesson for home parties, so I taught two kinds of terrines, a Vegetable Consomme one, and a salmon one.

We used fresh vegetables from a farmer's market. With the vegetable terrine, we made a dressing using citrus vinegar and maple syrup. This terrine holds together with gelatine cooled in a refrigerator.
With the salmon terrine, we made yougurt dill creamy dressing which also would go well with the vegetable terrine. This one was cooked in a water bath in the oven. Both of them were done right on time, so I was really relieved when we could try some after the class. Usually terrines taste better after sitting at least for over night.

While we waited for both terrines to be done, we made three kinds of hordorves.

The first one is buckwheat mini pancake topped with smoked salmon and creme fraiche. Creme fraiche is something similar to sour cream, but is lower in acidity and higher in fat. It is a common cream used in Europe.

The next one is America's favorite, "Deviled Egg". The name comes from "strong, spicy taste". In order to add the hot flavor, we used tabasco this time. The red color on the top is the sprinkles of powdered paprika.

The last one is mushroom tapanade. Sauteed mushrooms with different herbs, ground and spread over miniature toast. This one has a really good flavor, and it sure will become a nice accompaniment to wines.

All of these will be a popular starters for your holiday season parties!!