It's Christmas Eve, one of my favorite days of the year. I love the calm before the storm (or the rush before the storm)...I always feel like the simpler, the more low-key Christmas Eve, the better. This morning I watched Center Stage (for about the 250th time, no lie), ate some breakfast, and am now contemplating all of the baking I have to do today (bagels for Christmas morning, chocolate covered pretzels, and peanut butter blossoms). I have to run to the post office and pick up a couple packages and then also wrap pretty much all of my presents. It's quiet on my block, no kids outside playing in the dirty, leftover snow, no people shuffling to the subway and inevitably to their 9 to 5's. It's really, really lovely.
While today is shaping up to be, hopefully, a productive precursor to our holiday events this evening, tomorrow, and this weekend, I can't help thinking about my all-time favorite Christmas Eve ever. 1991 or '92, my family was living in White Plains, NY at the time. I couldn't have been older than 11 or 12 which means my brother was about 2 or 3. We played most of the day, fort maybe, or just silly kid games, while the most amazing kid-friendly block of movies played on t.v. in the background: Beetle Juice, The Goonies, and I can't remember what else. Damn near perfect day.
Anyway, about that picture up there - damn near perfect cinnamon bun, my friends, courtesy of Northportfishington Cookie Factory. I was lucky enough to snag an interview with Mike, owner and head baker, and he gave me a little tip on where and when I could find these little beauties. First of all, the icing - it's more of a (vegan) cream cheese base, so all I had to do was pop the bun in the microwave for about 15 seconds, just long enough to get a bit melty, then used a knife to smear the icing all around. The dough is just amazingly chewy and melt-in-your-mouth delicious. Probably the best "real" cinnamon bun I've ever had (when I say "real", I mean non-Cinnabon or any other kind of mass-produced kind). Check out my interview with him (I'll be posting it next week) to find out where you can snag all of Northportfishington's treats.
Hi there. You come here often?
And then there's this chocolate...bread AND chocolate. Dark chocolate with little french bread "crumbs" inside. I was really intrigued and excited when I brought this home, but a little underwhelmed after I cracked into it.
It's not that the chocolate itself isn't good, but I guess I just thought the bread part would be this revolutionary flavor enhancer. Not sure why I thought that, but basically this Theo bar tastes like nothing more than a dark chocolate Krackel. And I happen to despise Krackel. Grrr.
So now I'm really in trouble, because He's Just Not That Into You just came on HBO. I'm Just Not That Into This Movie all that much, but I have a problem: I'll watch any movie that comes on cable. And I mean ANY MOVIE. Bride Wars (one of the worst movies ever made), Miss Congeniality, pretty much anything with Brendan Fraser (yes, really)...it's sort of my weakness. I don't want to be watching these movies, I really don't!
Enough of my digressions. The whole point of this post was really just to say Happy Holidays! I hope all of you have enjoyed and continue to enjoy the season's eatings and greetings and fa la la la la-good times. I'm off from work for the next ten days or so, and I'm very very excited to post my entire backlog of field research interviews next week: Whipped Bakeshop, Open Source Cupcakes, Handcrafted Cookie Company, and Northportfishington Cookie Factory. So keep an eye out!
Merry merry!
that bun looks nice!
i hardly recognized it...
hehe.
i guess well hafta spread the icing more
cause that jawn looks proper now
Posted by: landers | 12/28/2009 at 12:07 PM