Category Archives: Holiday

Food Coma

Happy Thanksgiving, take 2!
amI hope you’re feeling just like this today, otherwise you didn’t do it right. My parental unit and I went over to my bro and sis-in-law’s house, also known as The Vegans, for Thanksgiving dinner last night. Today we’ll be making a second dinner so we have leftovers for the rest of the weekend, as is tradition.
am2For those of you who were asking about or confused by my Untappd check-in, I did not have Bud Light as a beverage. I just didn’t want to enter all the stats for my brother’s pumpkin homebrew – which was absolutely epic. Sweet and caramelized with actual flavors of roasted pumpkin, spicy cinnamon and a bite of clove. Also epic – that kale salad in the background. Recipe coming soon!
am3I loaded up a very attractive plate with turkey from the organic farm (story to follow below), vegan green bean salad, vegan meatloaf, vegan stuffing, kale salad (you guessed it – vegan) and vegan mashed potatoes with vegan gravy. VEEEGAN! Luckily, The Vegans have had years of experience in the vegan kitchen and have learned how to make absolutely delicious vegan food, sparing me from making many mistakes. Vegan.
am5For a special dessert, James decided to add a little rice whip to the top of the pumpkin ale. I stuck with Andrew’s homemade bourbon-scented coconut whip.
am6Whisked a little for an even more attractive picture… Horrible picture, delicious flavor.

Now for a little story about my trip to the organic farm. Please don’t read until you have finished all leftover turkey:

My Trip to the Farm
My mumsie and I drove up to a house at the head of a dead end road in farm country. The gate was closed and I would’ve been more than happy to continue on to the confines of a warm and bright grocery store to find a turkey vacuum sealed and easy to handle. My mumsie had other plans. We both stepped out of the car and walked to the gate.
“Hello…?” My mom called out across the muddy yard.
“Come on in.” A man wearing knee-high galoshes came walking out from the open garage, scanning the bushes around the perimeter, rifle in hand. I didn’t budge. There was no way I was making the first move.
“Come in!” He repeated, “Just close the gate behind you so the dogs don’t get out.”
We slowly entered, latched the gate behind us and stood there, waiting for the next instructions. The man continued his jaunt through the bushes, randomly poking into a few of them with the nose of the rifle before continuing on.
“Hi! I’m Shannon! What are your names?” A bouncy little girl with a pink bow wrapped around the crown of her ponytail came running up to us. My mom introduced herself and asked, “Shannon, where do we get our chickens and turkeys?”
Shannon smiled widely, took a deep breath and said, “I have chickens and ducks and ALL MY DUCKS ARE DEAD…”
I stood there, a terrified smile plastered across my face. We turned to the open garage where Shannon’s mother was efficiently sawing off the head of a plucked chicken before spraying out the inside with a high pressure hose. We walked over as the husband came back from his stroll around the yard.
“You didn’t find them?” His wife asked. “You know, I couldn’t find where they nested last night. We can’t just let them run free.”
He looked at his wife, shrugged and said, “These are hollow point bullets. It’d be a chicken explosion! I’ll just kill them tonight.” And walked off.

CHICKEN EXPLOSION. The end.
am1Happy Thanksgiving!!!

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Christmas Recap

Just putting a quick post up before I head off to pack for a two day trip down to San Diego!
Christmas?
Christmas!
CHRISTMAS!!!!

To sum this all up – Firestone XV (Ah-frickin-mazing! A beer to dream about for many years to come…), fancy rib-eye with a port wine and cranberry reduction and family time with a new game called Quiddler. All of the above were delicious.

Now I’m going to finish packing and preparing for two days in San Diego! Visiting Stone, Hess and Iron Fist again – this time with some family friends. Merry Christmas!!!

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Merry Christmas Eve!

The suicidal tree got sawed apart very quickly after its untimely death two days ago, so luckily we weren’t stranded to starve.
We headed over to Ladyface Alehouse and Brasserie for a Christmas Eve Eve late lunch/early dinner. Cauliflower au gratin!
Salt ‘n pepper fries with red ale ketchup.
Deliciously greasy burger with white cheddar cheese.
My last Hutash! Summer is definitely gone. I can’t keep dredging up the past – time to move on to the maltier winter beers!
A center cut of the bread pudding. I was so stuffed that I couldn’t finish my half of this, but it was SO. GOOD!
Somehow I was able to stuff a few cookies in later at Enegren Brewing, however. Kathy (aka Mama Enegren) made the pumpkin spice cookies (recipe via the lovely and talented chef Brie) and sugar cookie wreaths. Yet again, I ate until I hurt and loved it.
An early Christmas gift from my cousin, Allie! A taster board with chalk – PERFECT for my blind tastings. Happy happy happy!

Merry Christmas Eve, everyone! I’ll be back after spending a wonderful Christmas with my family eating foods, playing games (I hope there’s Liar’s Dice in my stocking tomorrey…) and celebrating the birth of Jesus! And then eating some more and drinking fine craft brews.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

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Christmas Tree Suicide

Today, we got a lovely surprise of a fresh Christmas tree gracing our street.
With the crazy Santa Ana winds, the gigantic pine tree outside my house came crashing down. We’d just driven past it into our driveway, and were talking about how it had looked like it was leaning more when we heard a gigantic thud. Luckily it didn’t hit any cars, houses or people.
It did demolish our neighbor’s fence though. The cops came driving up the street, I helped them out by standing on the tree, waving my arms and hollering, “It’s right here!” and then proceeded to take crazy amounts of pictures of the destruction.
Mass destruction. Delicious-smelling destruction.
Beautifully broken. Cheesily stated.
I felt the need for a senior photo here. I never got to do the classic peeking around/leaning on a tree pose for my high school senior pic…
Like that.

Or that.

THERE WE GO!

All my feelings of lost childhood/high school senior cheesy-photo-ops have been remedied.

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Holiday Eats

I’ll use any excuse to go out to eat. Holidays just happen to be a yearly built-in excuse. Over the past week, many restaurants have been visited, family functions have brought mass quantities of foods, and jeans have gotten a little tighter. It’s all worth it.
First up – family dinner. My extended family in Awesometown recently got a Big Green Egg, so we went down to enjoy some pulled pork that had been sitting on the smoker for hours. We supplied the homemade mac and cheese and baked beans. I ate until I hurt, then ate some more.
Yesterday I took my family to Two Guys from Italy – a restaurant in Moorpark that is owned by a German woman and sells amazing German food. Oh yeah, they make Italian food too. I ordered a cappuccino, which was delicious, even though I still don’t know what a cappuccino is. How is it different from a latte? Someone please explain.
I also ordered one of my latest obsessions (which I actually first tried at Two Guys from Italy) – jägerschnitzel. I’ve discovered it’s quite difficult to take a good picture of pork that’s been pounded flat, dredged in panko, fried and smothered in a wine and mushroom gravy, served alongside deliciously buttery dumplings called spaetzle. Trust trust me on the fact that it tastes delicious.
Today we checked out a brand new place in Newbury Park called La Cucina di Venti <– my Yelp review. I ordered the Mushroom Ravioli – I know, you’re asking yourself, mushrooms?? But Bexter hates/used to hate mushrooms! I may have been officially converted. This sounded good on the menu and tasted drop-dead GORGEOUS in my mouth. Possibly the best ravioli I’ve ever had, mushroom or not!
For dessert my mumsie ordered the limoncello gelato flute – light, refreshing and zesty, PLUS you get to keep the glass!
I ordered the rich and luscious tiramisu. Seriously, the most heavenly Italian meal I’ve ever consumed.
At the end of a busy holiday day, I like to have a warming glass of imperial stout. I’m repping Enegren’s latest beer Daniel Irons Oatmeal Stout because it’s amazing. Narcissism explosion commence – go check out Enegren’s newly launched website to see more pics I took. Narcissism explosion over.

That skims the top of my holiday eats so far! I’ll be sure to eat a lot more over the next few days before my excuses run out.

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