Have Yourself A Cabo Wabo Christmas

The de Joya, Chuidian, and Pastor families gathered in Elk Grove to celebrate Christmas together. It was also the 3rd Annual Cabo Wabo Christmas. Here's a picture of my dad, taken in the inaugural year:It's now 2 years later and the tradition is still going strong.

Tita Yeyet made an incredible Christmas Eve dinner of Kare-Kare, grilled pork chops & roasted tomatoes, Dungeness crab, and Lechon, followed by a spread of desserts. It was a raucous night with 4 doggies and 3 cats in the house (Mollie quickly showed them who was boss!), and family members all taking turns at the dining table.
Afterwards, the cousins stayed over at Erica&Chris's house. This year, the "kids" would be in charge of making Christmas dinner, and we had quite a menu planned. It was the first time we'd be attempting dinner for our parents, and we have a lot of expectations from prior years feasts to live up to! It was a lot of work, but a LOT of fun, and it looks like we're going to be doing it this way from now on. Already looking forward to Cabo Wabo Christmas #4!

Click HERE for our pics.

Holidazed

Every holiday season, my family makes a pilgrimage to this house on 34th Avenue & Quintara, a few blocks away:

picture from http://sunsetstyle.blogspot.com/2008/12/merry-chirstmas.html

It's a delightfully animatronic winter wonderland, replete with tinny xmas music and ice-skating teddy bears. Whenever we drive up and pull over to park, there are at least 3-4 other carloads of families doing the same thing, gawking from the car &/or walking up to stare at the house in awestruck wonder.

I got that picture from a blog, SunsetStyle, which chronicles the quirky personality of our little beachside neighborhood. It's a pretty brilliant blog, and there are a TON of crazy-looking homes within a 3-block radius of ours. Ah, the Sunset...

Fugly Sweaters Galore!

"... don we now our gay apparel..."

We held our annual Tree-Trimming Party, in which our friends come over and make the ornaments that will adorn our tree this year. Taking inspiration from our 1970s-1980s childhood memories, we christened this as our Ugly Holiday Sweater party. Our guests came bedecked and bedazzled in their fugliest holiday finest (and we said, the more obnoxious, the better!)



Justa came over early to help prepare the holiday spread (thank you Justa!) There was soooo much food, which kept arriving all night long as more people arrived! Our friends looooove to eat!

Click HERE for our pics. Fa la la laaa, la la la laaaaaaaaaaa!

A Winter Wonderland

St George Spirits in Alameda is truly one of the most magical places on earth. It's a craft distillery located in an old air force hangar (next to the Mythbusters shop), where they make the most exquisite small-batch hand-crafted spirits, including eau de vies (which are like grappa) and liqueurs, single malt whiskeys, and Hangar One Vodka (we are huge fans). Last year they debuted Absinthe Verte , the first absinthe legally made in the United States since 1912. We have a bottle of that too, and it's incredibly smooth and oh so delicious.

They recently released their handmade agave spirit, Agua Azul, otherwise known to most folks as tequila. However, just like how all "real" champagne has to be made in France's Champagne region, all "real" tequila must be made in Jalisco, Mexico - otherwise one cannot call it tequila. Just like the rest of the St George stuff, it's made on-site in their hangar (with agave pinas that they exported from Mexico), and thus can only legally be called an "agave-based spirit".

St. George hosts Open House events a few times a year, and this time around the theme was "1980s Winter Prom". For $40, they gave attendees tickets for 4 cocktails, 1 absinthe cocktail, 1 photograph at the photo station, and unlimited (ahem) "tastings" of all of their spirits. It goes without saying that there was also plenty of water stations to keep everyone hydrated, and plenty of hearty yummy food to keep the spirits in check.

Russell, Alden, and I had a blast. For more pics of the debauchery, click HERE.

RibDobo

A night of beer-fueled karaoke at the friendly neighborhood dive bar always seems to lead to an urge to cook the next day (like this). And Isa's mention of adobo last night put all sorts of crazy ideas into my head. I ended up waking up to a fever-dream of making adobo-glazed barbecue babyback ribs. Could I pull it off?

Click HERE for the answer!

Booze Cruise

Some very cool friends recently got us the gift of boozin' and cruisin' with Hornblower Cruises. So we took off on a beautiful clear weekend morning to enjoy a champagne brunch on the seas. The unlimited pours worked their magic, and we couldn't discern whether it was the boat swaying or whether it was us.
For more pics, click HERE.

Eat Your Colors

The onset of cooler weather signals the influx of hearty green and orange colors from Terra Firma Farm, the organic CSA farm we subscribe to, located in Winters, CA.Here's our box of produce this week. Loaded with goodness, just in time to fortify ourselves in the wet winter months. One of the things I love about Terra Firma is their inclusion of seasonal recipes in that week's newsletter, like this yummy Butternut Squash and Spinach Soup. Their recipes come in handy for those times when they send us vegetables I'm unfamiliar with, and I've learned so much!

A blog I've been following is Darya Pino's www.summertomato.com, which is filled with information on eating & living healthier. I like her approach, which doesn't focus on diets but instead talks about small & simple steps to improving your health and being mindful about what you put into your body. But at the same time, it leaves room for occasional indulgences without the guilt. I like this piece on Saving Money While Eating Healthy. It's realistic and do-able, and I highly recommend you check it out.