Stocking Stuffers

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: January is the saddest month for a baker. No one is interested in eating treats so it’s a quiet month for baking, plus my winter hibernation tendencies start to kick in. Here are a few noteworthy things that happened:

  • Every year my friend Krishna hosts a New Year’s Day brunch, which I have never attended as I usually refuse to leave my home on January 1st so I can stay in my jammies all day. Well, this year I put on my finest athleisure and ventured out, and it was just the most fun. Krishna prepared the most delicious spread (which I forgot to take a picture of) that I will use as future inspiration if I host a brunch of my own someday. She made a spinach, goat cheese and mushroom strata, spinach and artichoke tarts, a pile of bacon and a blueberry crumb cake. She also had a DIY Caesar Bar (lost on me as I’m not into them) and bottomless glasses of Champagne, which explains why I didn’t resurface from this party until about January 3rd.
  • The Golden Globes seem to get earlier every year, and my usual crew came over to watch with me. Since I just made our traditional GG feast (Beef Bourguignon & Mashed Potatoes) for my family Christmas meal, I switched it up on them, but luckily they’re easy to please. I made Everyday Meatballs, Spinach & Parmesan Orzo, Kale Caesar and Garlic Bread. I also made these little bacon wrapped/goat cheese stuffed dates, but it turns out maybe I’m not much of a savoury date person. I kind of burnt out after all that and didn’t have gas left to make dessert, so we just snacked on some leftover chocolate from my stocking stash from Danielle (pictured above).
  • Heather got the old gang back together at Craft for a free beer flight tasting and four course dinner. This place is across the street from my old office, so I have a bit of PTSD whenever I have to head over there, but I had a fantastic time catching up with my old Gastropost buddies Libby & Carole. I was also a bit surprised that the food was pretty good as I had many lacklustre lunches there back in the old days, so I can now recommend their mixed greens, mac & cheese and beer can chicken.
  • My friend Josie and I went to Rosalinda for a long overdue catch up. Rosalinda is serving up vegan Mexican dishes and we shared: corn fritters, citrus & jicama salad, roasted cauliflower tostada, roasted sunchokes and triple chocolate mousse for dessert. In all honesty, I felt everything (besides dessert) could have benefited from a heavy application of cotija cheese, but would still recommend it for your vegan loved ones.
  • I cooked a lot at home this month, including a few things from the archives: Slowcooker Buffalo Chicken, Cheesy Butternut Squash Rigatoni plus this Moroccan Chickpea & Eggplant Stew and Carrot Cake Breakfast Cookies that I’ve made before. I also made this delicious Chicken Meatball Tikka Masala for the first time.

Other non-foodie things I was obsessed with this month:

  • I only read one book this month, but it was excellent: She Said. This is the book by the two investigative journalists from the New York Times who broke the Harvey Weinstein story.
  • The Bachelor is back and I’ve taken over as Commissioner of our Fantasy League at work. Too bad I’m in second to last place based on my picks after the first episode! Also too bad Peter’s turned out to be a crap Bachelor and I hate all of the girls this season.
  • The bleak wasteland of January movies means I didn’t get out to see anything this month, instead I tried to re-watch most of The Mindy Project before it left Netflix at the beginning of February. How dare they!

Flashback!