Influx of Snowmen in the Living Room

The Christmas tree went up on December 1st and I decorated the house with the various winter/Christmas themed items I've collected over the years. Once everything was set out, I noticed that I have a snowman theme, as they dominate every free surface we have. I didn't intend to collect snowmen (most of these items were gifts), but these little dudes make me happy. They are always smiling!

And because we have a nice blanket of snow outside, I thought I'd showcase my snowmen chilling in the snow.

Snowman tea light

Tea light with snowman scene

Tea light with multiple snowmen

Snowman figurines

Snowman wine glasses

Snowman stocking

And last but not least, what would this season be like without the abominable snowman? This year Bumble is gaurding the candy dish, though he's doing a pretty bad job so far (we will need to refill it soon). Bumble is the only snowman I can happily say I picked up myself. I just love him.

Sweet Potato Fries #FoodPicFriday

Baked sweet potato fries are so incredibly good and addictive, it only takes me about 30 seconds to inhale an entire tray of them. I can't help but eat them so fast, and I'm always left wondering, 'why didn't I make two potatoes??' When the sweet potato is raw, one seems like a completely reasonable amount to eat, but when I finish the last fry, somehow there were never enough to begin with.

For these fries I used a recipe found over at Sally's Baking Addiction. I used a simple salt and pepper seasoning for mine, but stuck to her tips to get these fries super crispy. First they were coated in corn starch before they were seasoned/oiled, and then they were left to cool in the cooling oven for 20 minutes. I have to say they were enjoyably crispy. For an amazing lunch, I paired these fries with the steak and cheese sandwich I posted about yesterday.

Rocking Leftovers - Steak Sandwich

We periodically get an amazing deal on beef and then for the next few months we enjoy roasts, steaks, and stews. The meat goes a long way, and I always feel like I'm winning when there is leftover steak in the fridge.

What normally would have been steak and eggs, John suggested we use our leftovers for awesome steak sandwiches. AGREE. We used home made buns from the freezer, pulled out the toaster oven, and got to work on this tasty leftover lunch.

The bun was buttered and then layered with strips of steak and mozzarella cheese.

I added chicken and rib BBQ sauce to mine (not pictured) and it tasted fantastic. Possibly even better than the steak we originally had.

We served the sandwiches with home made sweet potato fries and life was beautiful!

On Repeat: "I'll Wait" by Sweet Alibi

One of my greatest strengths is the ability to obsess over music and listen to songs on repeat for hours. And no matter how long the track has been repeating, I don't get sick of the song. After a few hours of listening I will know all the words and want to hear it even more. The people I live with love that I do this and don't get annoyed with me at all (...I will keep telling myself that, anyway).

The song that's been at the top of my iTunes Plays Count this week is "I'll Wait" by Sweet Alibi.

I don't listen to a lot of radio these days, but while skipping stations in the car last week I landed on CBC Radio 2. I stopped there to hear "Fake Plastic Trees" by Radiohead and I had to keep listening when "I'll Wait" was played next. I have a place in my heart for Canadian folkie-rock, and "I'll Wait" hits every musical note I want it to.

They don't have a video for the song yet, but you can stream it online at CBC Music if you want to check it out.

Also if you add your email to Sweet Alibi's mailing list, you can download "I'll Wait" for free, which is what I did and have had it on repeat ever since.

Cake Try Outs

My Mom is turning 65 in a few weeks and I offered to make the cake. The only instruction I was given was: "chocolate". I thought there were a lot of places I could go with that so I started brainstorming ideas. One of my favourite ways to fancy up a cake is to add chocolate bars to it. One of Mom's favourites is Terry's Chocolate Orange, so I decided I would try making a chocolate orange cake. As I recently learned that it's good for me to try out new recipes, I spent much of Sunday fooling around in the kitchen with a chocolate orange cake.

The cake was super fun to bake and decorate, and because I was just making it for practice there was no stress while making it. I made a three layer cake that was iced mainly with whipped chocolate icing and had orange frosting between the layers and on the top.

This is what it looked like:

I was really happy with how the cake looked and it was actually pretty easy to decorate. I texted this picture to Mom and this was the response I got:

She is the sweetest, eh?

The look of the cake was what I wanted and I will definitely use some of the same decorative elements in the final version. The only thing that has to change is the taste. Turns out I went a little overboard with the orange extract that was added to the icing. So much so that my mouth actually tingled when I ate it. Whoops! It's still edible, but the chocolate orange balance just wasn't right. Dare I say, it was too much of a good thing.

But this is why I'm practicing. And I've learned a new baking rule: easy on the extract!

I still have a few weeks to figure out what cake I'll take to her birthday, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to adhere more to her initial instruction and just go with chocolate.