Christmas Brunch

This past Saturday I whipped myself and my KitchenAid into shape, and revived the annual Cookie Exchange. I added in a Christmas brunch because, well, I just feel better when I eat a little something sweet after I have a little something savory. So cookies after brunch sounded perfectly good to me!

I am lucky to have these girls (and several more who couldn't make it :( ) in my life.

Here's what was on the menu:

Bacon wrapped asparagus.

Baked farm-fresh eggs with baby Swiss. I love my farmer guy. There's nothing like a good egg to me.

Christmas fruit salad (all red and green. Ho, ho, ho!), hashbrown casserole (to die for, thanks Manda!), and croissants with fresh cranberry orange butter.

And this is my newest little gadget I just love. It's called a Butter Bell, or Butter Keeper. If you don't have one, and you love real butter or making your own flavored butters of any kind and want to keep it spreadable and room temp, this is a must.  I bought mine here. I actually went to an incredibly fun cooking class there while in Savannah for Thanksgiving with Lu and Jill, (Thanks, LuLu!!!) and this was my favorite purchase. ( Oh, and I learned how to make a mustard crusted, bacon wrapped pork loin with maple glaze that will make you sing Hallelujah. Recipe soon!)

We also had some dark hot chocolate with vanilla whipped cream, fruit tea, and then moved on to the dessert course....


Hello heaven, goodbye waistline.

I love a pretty sprinkle cookie.

At the end, you bag some up, take 'em home, and continue to stuff yourself for the remainder of the day. And have several new cookie recipes for your arsenal too!

May you be surrounded by deliciousness and those you love this Christmas season :)

xo dae