Photos from NYC

Just a few pictures to wet your appetitte. They are pretty self explanatory. Notice in the picture at Martha's show I'm wearing long sleeves to hide all the marks on my arm from where Dan "twisted" my arm to drink all those Dirty Martinis!!!!!

Pound Cake

We had a little Christmas Potluck at work this week. I made one of my usual Christmas cakes. I made it twice actually (long story). Here's the recipe...

Bourbon-Cream Cheese Pound Cake

1 1/2 cups butter, softened

1 8oz. package cream cheese, softened

3 cups sugar

6 large eggs

3 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup bourbon (you can substitute the same amount of milk, but why would you want to?)

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

1 1/2 cups toasted pecans (I used walnuts on cake number 2).

Beat butter and cream cheese at medium speed in mixer bowl until creamy. Gradually, add the sugar, beating until light and fluffy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating just until the yolk disappears into the batter.

Sift together flour and salt; add to butter mixture alternately with the bourbon, beginning and ending with the flour mixture. Beat batter at low speed just until blended after each addition. Fold in vanilla and pecans. Pour into a greased and floured 12 cup tube pan.

Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour and 30 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted into the center of cake comes out clean. Cool in pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes. Remove from pan and let cool completely. Finish with Powdered Sugar Glaze.

Powdered Sugar Glaze

Stir together 2 cups powdered sugar, 3 tablespoons milk and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract until smooth, adding another tablespoon milk, if necessary for desired consistency.

To decorate, drizzle the glaze over the cake. Then if you wish, pile flaked coconut on top and arrange sugared rosemary stems and cranberries around the cake. To sugar the rosemary and cranberries, heat 1/4 cup corn syrup in the microwave. Brush lightly the leaves and cranberries with the syrup, then sprinkle with sugar. Let set on waxed paper for up to 24 hours, or use them immediately.

New York City

Oh my gosh, I did not want to come back from New York City. It was the most amazing time. Let me give you a brief (maybe not) run down of the week that was... we arrived on Thursday night and after checking into our hotel, we took a walk over to Rockefeller Center to see the tree. Kids, let me tell you, television doesn't do it justice. Amazing to see in person. Then a walk through Times Square and then dinner at a little Irish pub. Cozy and delicious. Friday morning we started out on a walking tour of Central Park, a visit to Dylan's Candy Bar a little late afternoon visit to Bobby Van's where we ate the most delicious filet mignon/bleu cheese toasts and a couple dirty martinis (thank you Dan for introducing me to the deliciousness that is a dirty martini.) Then off to meet one of Dan's friends, Noel (that's like Knoll, not Noel like Christmas). Anyway, a whirlwind tour of bars, most of which I don't remember the names of, and dinner at a place called "The Dish" where I had some really great Manhattan clam chowder. Then a few sing-a-long bars later and we ended the night with a pumpkin cupcake from Billy's Bakery. Saturday morning we ate breakfast at some little diner, then we rode the subway to the TKTS booth to get tickets to see "Mary Poppins". We did a lot of walking over the next two days, so which day we saw what gets a little confusing at this point. We ate at Lombardi's, went to Canal Street, Little Italy, saw Ground Zero, or at least what you could see of it, visited several H&M locations, walked , saw all the holiday windows, walked and walked and walked. On Sunday, we went to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. Oh, Mary Poppins was great by the way, and after the show we ate at Carmine's, great meatballs, great mushrooms and great dirty martinis, (thanks again Dan.) On Monday morning, we left the hotel around 5am to get in line for the Today Show, not too many other fools out that early, so it did give me a great opportunity to take some unobstructed pictures of the tree in Rockefeller Plaza. I did get on the show, in case you didn't catch it. After we left and defrosted with some Eggs Benedict we took a tour of the Empire State Building. It was great, although I don't remember Tom Hanks or Meg Ryan having to go through such security measures to get to the top, unfortunately in this day and age, that relationship would never have happened, because one of them would have been long gone. Later we went to Bryant Park, and another late afternoon visit to Bobby Van's for more bleu cheese/filet toasts and you guessed it, dirty martinis. (Dan...) Tuesday, our last day in the big city, was the be all, end all...the Martha Freakin' Stewart Show. For those of you who didn't see us on the Today Show, you had plenty of opportunities to catch us on Martha, 8, yes 8 opportunities to be exact. I think I'm well on my way to catching her attention. Anyway, that studio is amazing and I don't even have to tell you how badly I want to work there. Anyway, we got some free stuff, 2 cookbooks, a set of 4 Ball jars, a cookie...not a bad haul for doing nothing. We ended our day and our trip with another visit to Carmine's , good meatballs, good mushrooms and I don't even have to say it...dirty martinis.