6 tips for planning the perfect trip to dazzling European Christmas markets

I am a Christmas enthusiast. the kind of gal who puts out the tree on the day after Thanksgiving and has holiday music on blast all season. So, it should come as little surprise that I am OBSESSED with European Christmas markets! Want to join in the festive fun? Read on for 6 tips for planning the perfect trip after the jump!

Thurn und Taxis in Regensburg, Germany

7 delicious global Christmas cocktails to bring you cheer this holiday

I love Christmas. From the decorations to blasting holiday playlists, I'm all in. But one of my favorite December treats is holiday booze. You've probably tried eggnog and mulled wine, but allow me to expand your Christmas beverage palate with a few other favorites from other cultures.

Read on for holiday cocktails from around the world...

Take your holiday turkey to the next level with a Masterbuilt Turkey Fryer

We took a Masterbuilt Turkey Fryer for a spin back in 2017. Just in time for the holidays, I wanted to share this oldie but goodie again. 

My childhood memories of Thanksgiving include parades, football, and the seemingly endless wait for the turkey to come out of the oven.  Roasted turkey is pretty good when it's smothered in gravy and accompanied by cranberry dressing, stuffing, and all the other goodies that Turkey Day entails, but without all those extras it's a little lacking.  Enter fried turkey.

Read on for more about our turkey frying experience.

Get in the Christmas spirit with 3 delightful days in NYC

Photo by Jay Joshi on Unsplash

From Miracle on 34th Street to one of my personal holiday faves, Elf, Christmas in NYC lives large in our cultural imagination. It's a classic for a reason. There's just something about the decorations, the department store windows, the hustle and bustle of shoppers...

Want to plan your own family-friendly visit to NYC for the holidays? Read on!

Thanksgiving Turkey, Southern Style: Butterball Indoor Electric Turkey Fryer

My childhood memories of Thanksgiving include parades, football, and the seemingly endless wait for the turkey to come out of the oven.  Roasted turkey is pretty good when it's smothered in gravy and accompanied by cranberry dressing, stuffing, and all the other goodies that Turkey Day entails, but without all those extras it's a little lacking.  Enter fried turkey.

Unlike oven-roasting, which takes about four and a half hours for a 12-pound turkey, deep frying your turkey takes about 4 minutes per pound, meaning that the turkey is done in less than an hour.  Better yet, instead of dry meat, you are left with a moist turkey and delicious, golden-fried skin.

I was lucky enough to try out* the Butterball Electric Turkey Fryer for a pre-Thanksgiving fried turkey rehearsal.  Unfortunately, the camera ate my pics of the finished product, but I was really impressed by how simple and easy it was to use.  Simply fill the fryer with about two gallons of peanut oil, pre-heat the oil for about a half-hour (the fryer lets you know when it's ready), and put the turkey--in its metal basket--into the fryer.  Just make sure that your turkey is completely thawed before frying unless you want to end up on the local news.

I was very impressed with how thoughtfully designed the fryer is.  Manufactured by our friends at Masterbuilt, who previously let us take one of their awesome Electric Smokehouses on a test drive, the Butterball Fryer is meant to be used indoors -- I set it up on the kitchen island. The lid keeps splatter contained while letting steam escape.  Once the turkey is done cooking, you can lift the basket and attach it to the rim of the fryer above the oil vat so that the turkey can drain and cool without leaving an oily mess behind. Afterward, the drain valve simplified clean-up and made it easy to save the oil for another day (oil has about six hours of cooking life in it - that's a lot of turkeys).

If you're on the fence about trying a fried turkey, I say just go for it.  It's simple, hard to screw up, and way faster than oven roasting.  Best of all, it's decidedly better tasting!

You can get the Butterball Electric Turkey Fryer XL (which accommodates up to a 20 lb turkey) in time for Christmas at Amazon. Check Costco or your local supermarket for large containers of peanut oil, and don't forget the marinade injector.  Happy Thanksgiving!

*Thank you to the folks at Masterbuilt for providing the fryer used in this article.  While the fryer was free, my enthusiasm is 100% real!

Thanksgiving menu planning

This year won't be the first time I've missed Thanksgiving with my family. During my LA years, it wasn't worth it to pay the exorbitant airfares to come home so close to coming home for Christmas. I always found something to do whether it was talking my way into an invite to a well-to-do friend's catered Thanksgiving with her family or snagging an invite to enjoy a Thanksgiving buffet at the Four Seasons with another friend. I suppose there are enough glamorous ways to get your hands on some turkey in LA to keep a gal occupied.

In more recent years, I've used the days off from work to go on a vacation, so a couple years back instead of chowing down on stuffing and mashed potatoes with the fam, I was slurping pho in Vietnam with a girlfriend.

This year, I'm off to the UK for Thanksgiving for and old friend's wedding. I'm thrilled to be going back to London, one of my favorite places on earth, but I'm a bit sad to miss out on all the great food and the opportunity to spend a day in the kitchen with my mother and sister. Now that I can cook, there's something special about sharing that time with them. That's why I've convinced my mom that it's worthwhile to cook an early Thanksgiving style meal for me, which we'll do the weekend before the holiday. How great is my mom? She's going to make turkey twice in a week just to include me in the process!

So that leads to me to now, and I'm trying to sort through all of the Thanksgiving recipes out there to come up with a great menu. I haven't picked my favorites yet, but below is a collection of some of the most exciting recipes I've found for turkey, side dishes, dessert, and cocktails. I'll keep you posted on what menu we choose, but check these out for your own holiday fete!

Turkey

Turkey with tangerine glaze
Apricot glazed turkey with fresh herb gravy
Chile roasted turkey with chorizo-corn bread stuffingSide DishesCranberry glazed sweet potatoes
Potato mushroom pie
Celery salad with walnuts and pecorino
Green beans with cremini mushroom sauce
Cranberry clementine sauce
Maple glazed parsnips and carrots
Bacon biscuits with roasted apple butter
Cornbread and sausage stuffing
Spicy cornbread stuffing
Butternut squash with brown butter

Dessert

Pumpkin cheesecake with pecan praline topping
Pumpkin swirl brownies
Chocolate pecan pie
Chocolate pumpkin cheesecake bars
Pumpkin whoopie pie

Beverages

Hot Spiced Wine
Pomegranite punch
Hot apple pie

Smoked (and Grilled) Baby Back Ribs with the Masterbuilt Smoker

July 4th weekend is almost here, but why settle for just burgers on the grill when you can wow your friends and family with succulent smoked baby back ribs? Fire up your Masterbuilt Electric Smoker...it's on!

It's center-of-the-sun hot in Atlanta right now, so you want to keep things easy. We used a store bought bbq sauce. I recommend taking the extra time at the grocery store to find one without high fructose corn syrup. That's harder than you'd think! Then we finished these bad boys on the grill to avoid the extra hour on the smoker and give them a little bit of char. More time for kicking back with a cold beer and some air conditioning.

I've never been a huge ribs fan (hard to look cute while gnawing at a bone!), but these were tender, full of smoky sweet flavor and well worth throwing caution to the wind and covering your face in sauce! Easy peasy recipe after the jump.

Winter Desserts

Apologies for going AWOL this week, but Mr. AT and I finally moved into our adorable new house, and we just got the internet up and running today.

Holiday time is the perfect excuse to indulge your sweet tooth, right? So I'm eager to try my hand at baking something wintery now that my kitchen is cleared out.

So what to bake?

Pumpkin Cheesecake with Marshmallow-Sour Cream Topping and Gingersnap Crust
I just love pumpkin flavored desserts, and marshmallow topping sounds pretty incredible!

Winter-Spiced Molten Chocolate Cakes with Rum-Ginger Ice Cream
Molten Chocolate Cakes are my specialty, and this recipe puts a nice wintery twist to it. Although I'm not sure where on earth I'd get crystallized ginger???

Pumpkin Cheesecake with Pecan Praline Topping
Ah more pumpkin. I made a pumpkin cheesecake previously and it was delectable.

Italian Trifle with Marsala Syrup
For my Italian hubby, perhaps?

Pere Roux's Cake
Sounds delectable but I don't have time to let bananas ripen. Another time for sure!

Chocolate ganache bread pudding
Any excuse to drink port is AOK by me.

Recipe: Peanut Butter Banana Cream Pie from Baked Explorations

I volunteered to bring dessert to our friends' New Year's dinner party. I opted for a maple bourbon cheesecake, but alas, the drawback of finding recipes on random blogs via pinterest is that sometimes the instructions stink. This led to a, shall we say, less than beautiful cheesecake.

We had little time and an ugly as all get out cake, so after I stomped about and had a bit of a hissy fit, my darling hubby stepped in to save the day by heading back to the grocery store to get me ingredients for something else.

The guys behind Baked know how to make a gorgeous and delicious dessert, so I eschewed Pinterest and went old school with an actual cookbook - Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented.

Banana cream pie is surely one of the most delicious and comforting desserts out there, and peanut butter is such a divine combo with bananas, so I knew this recipe was certain to blow the maple bourbon cheesecake out of the water. And sure enough it did. It was easy to prepare, appealing to look at and just as heavenly as it sounds!

The crust was simple to make and a classic accompaniment for banana cream pie. The vanilla pudding is very subtle and would also be good on its own. The peanut butter icing is pure bliss and may have compelled me and the Mr. to lick the bowl and beaters clean. It would make a great icing for other desserts as well, such as chocolate cupcakes.

Turns out my cheesecake actually tasted pretty good, too, despite its uggo appearance, but this was the clear star of dessert. Yum!

Full recipe

Detroit Dining: We Came, We Celebrated, We Ate

Welcome back from the holidays, fair readers. It was a nice long break for me! A good chunk of my time off was spent in Michigan, land of cars, wolverines and my honey's family!

So I thought I'd kickoff off the new year with a quick round up of what went down in my hubby's hood.

The rather scary and snowy drive from Michigan back to Atlanta

It's hard to believe, but I've just entered the home stretch of my pregnancy (2 trimesters down, 1 to go!) I was lucky enough over the break to be feted by my mother-in-law and my hubby's family and friends up in Michigan. The Courthouse Grill was kitted out with Christmas decorations galore, and served up a lovely luncheon of chicken cherry salad, chicken primavera and my personal fave, chicken picatta. Good conversation, tasty eats and loads of adorable and generous gifts for Baby V...what's not to love? A huge thank you to everyone for the wonderful gifts and especially to my mother-in-law for putting on such an all around delightful event!

Little know fact (at least in our neck of the woods) - Dearborn, MI, is not only home to Ford Motor Company, but also to America's largest population of Arab Americans. That makes for some good middle eastern dining options. We dined at Al-Ameer Restaurant, which is tucked away in an unassuming strip mall. The ambiance was better than I expected. I was envisioning hole in the wall, but it was a pleasant and fairly traditional feeling dining room.


We have plenty of places in Atlanta to get hummus and falafal, but how many places serve lesser known options like arayes or sujuk? I loved the arayes' combination of textures and flavors, with crisp toasted bread housing crunchy pinenuts and garlicy lamb. Dipping it in a cool, sour yogurt, made it even better. Sujuk is a delectable combination of slightly spicy sausage cooked with tomatoes in a tart sauce. We used pita to scoop up every last bit of tomatoey goodness.


Fried eggplant and cauliflower, although not quite as exciting as I'd hoped for, still rounded out the meal nicely. Bizarrely, they come with a side of fries, so it was a Middle Eastern fried bonanza. Al Ameer is also known for their smoothies. We were keen to try an avocado based smoothie, but they were out so we opted for the recommended milk cocktail (milk, banana, honey, and ice), which was unfortunately pretty bland.


And last up on our dining out in Michigan tour was a stop at Ann Arbor's beloved Zingerman's Roadhouse, a kitschy and cozy upscale comfort food favorite. While we waited I enjoyed a root beer on tap, which is quite the treat when you're el prego. Then we were fortunate enough to get a freebie order of Sea Island Sweet Potato Fries (twice cooked and served with spicy mayo), which although simple, were crazy delicious. So soft and sweet and that sauce was to die for!

For my entree, I went for the fried chicken, and was unfortunately disappointed by that. It seemed a little overcooked and under-salted. Fortunately we also split an order of pimento Bacon Macaroni (Martelli pasta caramelized with applewood smoked bacon and our housemade Southern pimento cheese). At $18.50, it ain't cheap, but there was plenty for 3 of us to share, and it was just as ooey gooey decadent as you'd expect. Yum!

Add to that several impressive home-cooked meals (spaghetti and meatballs, honey glazed ham and roasted turkey...oh my!), and we were well fed indeed. Now on to those New Year's resolutions to cut down on the heavy food and sweets...sigh...

The Ultimate Cookout Menu

This weekend we threw our first big party in ages - a Labor Day BBQ. Since the weather is finally about to cool down, I think it's actually just the start of Atlanta grilling season. 

Interested in a relatively low on effort, high on taste cookout menu?

Burgers and Sausages
Publix offers a 75/25 mix of ground beef made from steak trimmings in large packs. I went with this because more fat is a good thing in my book. Just add salt and pepper and make sure you don't over handle the meat. Put a little thumb print in the top to make sure they don't get too rounded during grilling. I topped with American cheese because it's the perfect melting cheese.

Ketchup and mustard were of course on offer, but so was special sauce, a homemade variation on thousand island dressing. I just now realized I forgot to put out the iceberg lettuce (darn!), but there were fresh tomatoes on hand, too.

We also picked up frankfurters, bratwurst and kielbasa from Pine Street Market. If you haven't been, you must go - this Avondale Estates butcher shop has awesome locally made products and a super helpful staff. We snagged some sauerkraut from the Hil, Phickles Pickles, and spectacular applewood smoked bacon while we were there, too.

Creamy Cilantro Lime Slaw
I love a good slaw to balance out the richness of the burgers and sausage. I opted for a creamy cilantro lime slaw. It can be made in advance and tastes great. It would also be delish paired with fish tacos.

Semi-Homemade Baked Beans
With some much to prep, I didn't have it in me to try to make the beans totally from scratch. So I went the Sandra Lee route and combined bacon, ketchup, honey, brown sugar and hot sauce with canned baked beans. Cheating, yes, but they turned out so rich and sweet, and made for great beanie weenie leftovers last night when I was too tired to cook dinner.

Spinach and Artichoke Dip
To give everyone something to munch on while the grill was firing up, I whipped up a spinach and artichoke dip and served it with tortilla chips. Everyone loves a good dip, right? I'm not sure this melted quite the way I wanted it to, even after 10 minutes extra cooking, but it was still imminently scarfable, so it turned out aok.

We had to have one healthy option, so we threw in a fruit salad. For the non-meat eaters, I headed inside to cook up a Pesto Grilled Cheese with fresh pesto I made the night before from our herb garden. Tonight the Mr. threw that pesto and some cheese and tomatoes over chicken and pasta and blew my mind. Damn, why don't I eat more pesto?

Peach Lemonade
For a cocktail, I combined peach nectar with fresh lemon juice and a healthy splash of rum, garnished with fresh peach slices. Those boozy peach slices made for a tasty treat after the party, too! Works well as a mocktail for the non-drinkers, too.

For dessert, my sister and brother brought boozy Old Fashioned brownies (with bourbon, cherry and orange) and for the kiddos a Peppermint Patty brownie. They were oh so good, but alas I don't have the recipes. Want to make something similar, here's one option for bourbon brownies.

It certainly wasn't easy getting this all ready, but in the end, with some prep the night before, I was able to serve nearly 20 people by 2 pm without too much craziness. A special big thanks to the Mr., griller extraordinaire and to all my friends who made it such a fun afternoon!

Be sure to follow my cookout board on Pinterest!

Super Bowl Sunday Eats

Commercial Madonna  Football-lovers rejoice, Sunday brings the match up of the hunky Tom Brady and the boring Manning brother (what? I never claimed to actually like football!). Since clearly I'm not there for the sports, it's all about the snacks. Here's a roundup of some of the tastiest Super Bowl eats ideas from around the web:

Dips
Jalapeno Popper Dip
Buffalo Chicken Dip
Southwestern Layer Bean Dip (a better for you option)
A grab bag of dips from Eatocracy
My personal fave pimento cheese (I recommend just throwing it all in a food processor and cutting down on the mayo)

(Inspired by) Wings
Boneless Buffalo Wings (a better for you option)
Buffalo Meatballs (one of our new fave dinner options)
Crispy Baked Wings
Buffalo Chicken Potato Skins


Sweets
Caramel Swirled Pretzel M&M Blondies
Pumpkin Mini Cakes
Chocolate Stout Brownies
Corona and Blue Moon Cupcakes

Here's hoping the game ends with a score of 19-21 so I an win my office pool. Apparently this has happened only once in Super Bowl history so my odds aren't looking good!

Health.com Names the 50 Holiday Foods Not to Eat

Nothing says a happy holidays like a list of 50 traditional holiday foods you shouldn't eat. You can thank Health.com for that little treat.  A wee bit heavy handed don't you think? It's not a Ways to Eat Healthy this Holiday or Holiday Treats Are Worst For You Thank You Think, no, it's just a list that flat out says you shouldn't be eating just about everything you'd want to eat over the holidays.

Sure the obvious suspects are there -- eggnog, pecan pie and yule logs. But then so are holiday staples like prime rib, glazed ham, and mashed potatoes.  In fact, just about everything you might eat (and enjoy!) over the holidays is on the list.

I'm all for trying to not totally blow your diet over the holidays (although that's exactly what I'm doing these days), but this article is absurd. If you tell a person not to eat candy canes and to pass on Aunt Sally's green bean casserole, how are they supposed to join in on the holiday fun? I say everything in moderation, at least when it comes to enjoying the holidays!

For the record, I had hot buttered rum, prime rib and potato pancakes this weekend (in addition to some cookies and bread pudding which are shockingly not on the list), and I loved every last minute of it!

Pies, Pies, Pies!

I've volunteered for dessert making duty on Thanksgiving. I love baking, mostly because it's an excuse to eat something ridiculous when all is said and done. But the wealth of holiday appropriate pies is overwhelming. What to pick?

Mr. AT has requested pumpkin, but even that is fraught with options...

Traditional - Pumpkin Pie with Spiced Whipped Cream or Spiced Pumpkin Pie
Chocolate - Triple Chocolate Pumpkin Pie
Salted - Salted Caramel Pumpkin Pie
Caramel - Double-Decker Pumpkin Caramel Pie

Current front runner is one of the more traditional ones with a scoop of homemade cream cheese ice cream. Yum!

A British Holiday Feast: Rib Roast with Horseradish Sauce, Yorkshire Pudding and Minted Peas

This is my first ever Christmas spent in my own home, and not wanting to tempt fate, I decided to do a Christmas dinner test run. I’ve been pouring over my old issues of Domino (RIP my beloved) looking for decorating ideas, and I stumbled upon an old article about a British dinner party. It sounded perfect – standing rib roast with horseradish sauce, Yorkshire pudding, minted peas and gingered carrots.

So I headed to Whole Foods, the place I figured was most likely to have standing rib roast. I didn’t see any in the display, but when I asked the guy said he had some in back. Great, right? So I went about finding the other ingredients while the butcher worked his magic. I returned to grab the 3 ribs I’d requested (my recipe called for 5, but I was just cooking for Mr. AT and myself so I scaled back). I was about to go check out when I looked down and realized that my rather large package of rib roast was going to cost me $87. Whaaaaaaaaaaat??? I almost cried. Seriously. After frantic calls to my mother and Mr. AT asking what I should do (yes, I still call my mother for things like this!), I got up the nerve to go back and give a rib back. $59 bucks later I left Whole Foods as the proud and somewhat disgruntled owner of 2 ribs. That is not a mistake I will EVER make again. That price was bananas. Fortunately I hear Costco is the way to go so I guess that’s what test runs are for.

After spending all of that money, I was determined not to botch these recipes. Fortunately they were pretty fool proof. I always thought meals like this were only for special occasions because they were hard to do, but now I realize it’s because they’re time consuming and really damned expensive! The meat component of the meal couldn’t be any easier – it’s just salt and pepper and proper roasting time. I tried to guesstimate how much less time 2 ribs would take than the 5 in my recipe, but in the end I was way off, and I just kept checking on it until it reached 125 degrees.

Minted peas were also a revelation. This recipe is a take on the classic British dish, mushy peas. I prefer my peas unmushy, so this was perfect.  I virtually never purchase frozen vegetables, but these were awfully good and so easy. Who knew frozen peas, mint and butter could be so good? Because these recipes were in a now defunct magazine, i don’t have online versions of them, so I found recipes online that approximated them. The one I provide below uses olive oil, whereas I used butter. I’m sure it’s great either way.

This biggest unknown was Yorkshire Pudding. I for one would never have guessed that Yorkshire Pudding is actually much like a popover. But even better, it’s a popover made in the beef juices from the roast. Could there be anything more delicious? Little sister had warned me that her past attempts to make this recipe had not turned out, so I was wary, especially because I was cutting down the serving size from the recipe significantly. In the end, the center of my pudding fell a bit, and the bottom center was a bit too soggy with juices, but all around the center, the pudding was fluffy and so yummy. Perfect for sopping up juices from your plate! I think I just always pictured Yorkshire Pudding being some sort of dessert, but I was pleasantly surprised to learn the truth!
In the end, it was quite a repast for a random Sunday evening. Two ribs lasted us 2 full dinners, so I suppose that works out $15 bucks a head a meal – not cheap, but not much worse than buying a nice steak at the store and certainly cheaper than going out for a comparable meal. I was quite proud of myself, and I suspect this meal would impress anyone you might make it for. So elaborate and flavorful and filling! Now I just have to find a meat purveyor that won’t send me to the poor house!

Sunday Rib Roast

Green Peas with Mint