Tasty Tuesday - New Years Eve Dinner for Two

So, you’ve decided to skip the crowds and spend New Year’s Eve at home with your honey. These suggestions should go well with most types of champagne (in general, when serving champagne, it’s best to stick with lightly spiced Cantonese cuisine, particularly seafood dishes). If you’re serving wine, a German Riesling would be a good choice.

Start with some Spring Rolls as an appetizer. Feel free to nibble on them with some wine while preparing the main dish together.

Main Dish – Shrimp in Lobster Sauce

Ingredients:

• Fresh shrimp, deveined and butterflied, 10 - 15 per person
• 4 to 8 spring onion (green onions, scallions), chopped
• 2 large garlic cloves, chopped or minced
• 2 cups of chicken stock (2 cups water with chicken bouillon powder, or chicken broth)
• 4 tablespoons of sweet white wine, such as sweet Glen Ellen White Zinfandel
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 2 1/2 tablespoons of Cornstarch and 1/2 cup of water
• 4 egg whites, beaten with 1/4 cup of water
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil for stir-frying
• 1 to 2 cups pork fried rice (1 cup for 2 people, 2 cups for 3 or more)
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Preparation:

Rinse the shrimp in warm water and pat dry. Rinse the spring onions, drain and chop. Chop or mince the garlic cloves.
Combine the chicken stock, white wine, soy sauce, and sugar and set aside. In a small bowl, dissolve the cornstarch into 1/2 cup water. Whisk the egg whites into 1/4 cup water and set aside.
  Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a wok, large pot, or frying pan or skillet on medium high to high heat.
Stir fry the garlic and spring onions for about 30 seconds to a minute, taking care not to burn the garlic.
Add the shrimp and stir fry for 2 minutes.
Add the chicken broth mixture, bring to a boil and boil about 1 minute.
Re-stir the cornstarch and water mixture and stir it into broth. Immediately afterward, slowly pour in the egg whites, breaking them up by gently stirring them with a fork (the author recommends stirring them twice across and then twice across again in a tic tack toe pattern). Be careful not to over stir the egg whites.
  

The dish is ready when the sauce begins to boil and thicken. Serve over the pork fried rice and steamed Snow Peas.

Be sure to have some Fortune Cookies for after the meal.

Add Romance to Your Holidays

The holiday season is a busy and often stressful time. Days are filled with shopping, wrapping, baking and holiday parties. For couples who have children, family time is important but can become consuming. Sometimes it seems as if the holidays are too commercial and geared towards children. Perhaps we need to encourage the inner child in all of us to come out and play.

The holidays are the perfect time to relight that fire with your honey. Being married to a pilot with a crazy type of schedule has taught me to grab romance when I can. We are lucky enough to live close to Frankenmuth (Michigan) home of Bronner’s – the World’s Largest Christmas Store. However, we haven’t visited Bronner’s in many years we do enjoy wandering around the quaint German influenced town filled with unique shops, coffee houses, wineries and a brewery. Even our boys appreciate the opportunity to nibble on fresh sausage sticks while milling around the shops

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Romance doesn’t have to take up an entire day and you don’t necessarily have to be alone together. Cherish little moments. Add some mistletoe to your decorations and take advantage when you and your honey are caught under it.

Here a few ideas to add some romance to your holiday:

1.       Take a walk in a park

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2.       Visit a local tree farm. Cut down a tree or purchase some fresh greens to decorate with. Many local farms have bonfires and offer cocoa.

3.       Go ice skating. Many towns will have an outdoor rink for the season. Indoor rinks often have rental skates available.

4.       Sip hot chocolate by the fire. Try adding a little Bailey’s Irish Cream, Peppermint Schnapps or Cherry Schnapps to your cocoa. Warm, mulled cider or wine is a delight as well.

5.       Share a dessert by candlelight. Make sure you have whipped cream handy. It might come in handy later. *wink, wink*

6.       Cook a meal together. Even if kids are helping, you and your honey can sip wine and steal some sexy glances. Flirt with each other.

7.       Watch a Christmas themed movie. Cuddle together under a blanket. Feed each other popcorn.

8.       Have a leisurely breakfast in bed. At our house, the boys sleep in late so hubby and I lounge in bed sipping coffee and watching the birds at the feeder outside our bedroom window.

9.       Spend an evening at the theater. Local theater troops and orchestras often have Christmas themed performances at reasonable prices.

10.   Take a drive to “nowhere in particular” and stop whenever inspired or park in a secluded spot to gaze at the stars. Maybe even pack a light picnic basket and be sure to take a warm blanket.

111. Visit a coffee shop you’ve never been to. Some shops have local musicians and poetry readings.

1  12. Want to do something big? Rent a cabin in the woods for a weekend getaway.

Friday Funnies

Keep It Together During Holidays

Work. Shopping. Parties. Travel. Special Events.

During the month of December, there will be many demands on your time. 

Stress levels may rise. At the end of the day, exhaustion sets in. 

Even Santa and Mrs. Claus make time for alone time.

Here a few tips to "keep it together" during the holiday season.

* Try not to schedule to many events right after each other. Give yourself time between each one.

* Take time to sit with your honey and make a list of things you enjoy the most about the holiday.
This will not only give you quality time together, but also help keep you in the Christmas spirit.

*Schedule certain things from your list to do together. Yes... write it down! Make a date of it.

*Speak with family members in advance. Schedule family meals, parties and limit gift giving.

*Help each other. Help a friend make cookies. Help a relative wrap gifts. Spending time together and taking care of a "chore" at the same time.

*As a couple make a new family tradition.

Monday Mistletoe

"The mistletoe is hung up near a doorway or in the kitchen and young men have the privilege of kissing girls under it, plucking each time a berry from the bush. When the berries are all plucked the privilege ceases." 

The tradition of kissing under the mistletoe is one of my favorites and I believe a lot of kissing under the mistletoe has been going on for ages. In today's tradition the part about plucking the berries (which, incidentally, are poisonous), and then all kissing under the mistletoe ends when the berries run out!

As a little girl, my mother told me how a young lady standing under a ball of mistletoe, brightly trimmed with evergreens, ribbons, and ornaments, cannot refuse to be kissed. Such a kiss could mean deep romance or lasting friendship and goodwill. If the girl remained unkissed, she cannot expect not to marry the following year. 

I found references of "kissing under the mistletoe" in Celtic rituals and Norse mythology. In Gaul, the land of the Celts, for instance, the Druids considered it a sacred plant. It was believed to have medicinal qualities and mysterious supernatural powers.  (Hmm... I wonder what kind of "power" I would have if I wear a piece of mistletoe on my coat. After all... I am Scandinavian.)

The Norse myth of Baldur. Baldur's death and resurrection is one of the most fascinating Norse myths and stands at the beginning of the history of mistletoe as a "kissing" plant. 

Baldur's mother was the Norse goddess, Frigga. When Baldur was born, Frigga made each and every plant, animal and inanimate object promise not to harm Baldur. But Frigga overlooked the mistletoe plant -- and the mischievous god of the Norse myths, Loki, took advantage of this oversight.

Ever the prankster, Loki tricked one of the other gods into killing Baldur with a spear fashioned from mistletoe. The demise of Baldur, a vegetation deity in the Norse myths, brought winter into the world, although the gods did eventually restore Baldur to life.

After which Frigga pronounced the mistletoe sacred,
 ordering that from now on it should bring love rather than death into the world.

Happily complying with Frigga's wishes, any two people passing under the plant from now on would celebrate Baldur's resurrection by kissing under the mistletoe. 

I have my mistletoe hanging. 

Do you?