My Madison Bistro

Merry Christmas, everyone! Whether or not you celebrate a holiday at this time of year, I hope you and yours have a wonderful season.

In my family, we open gifts Christmas Eve after enjoying punch, brandy slush, and cookies & candy.

Christmas Day always has a more time-consuming, special meal. Last year, I baked fresh bread and my mom made prime rib. (I don’t recall the rest of the menu, as we were pretty focused on those two items…) This year, my mom was up early to get the turkey breast and ham going (after making beef tips and several appetizers the night before, not to mention a fondue dinner & dessert the night prior to that – how does she do it???), as well as to organize the rest of our Christmas feast.

Just before we sat down to our meal, I snapped a quick picture of the table:

For Christmas, I received a few new cooking/baking/food related gifts (shocking, huh?)…

One of my new cookbooks! I adore Bon Appetit and have been pleased with the results of any dessert of theirs I’ve made thus far. Expect to see quite a few new things from this tome.

I expect to have a lot of fun trying new things with this rosemary olive oil, be it salads, trying it with various breads and pastas (including the pictured fettuccine), roasting chickens, and using it as a finishing oil.

And I finally settled on French Onion Soup bowls! I’ve showcased that particular soup on here twice, and I’ve been waiting to try out another recipe I recently saw.

Have a wonderful day, everyone!

Tags: beef, candy, comfort food, cookies, cranberries, stuffing, turkey

Are you looking to add decadence to your holiday brunch menu? How about a simple, easy-to-prepare dish that most everyone will love?

May I suggest bread pudding? It’s sweet, it’s filling, and it can be special. The first time I had a taste was when I went to Restaurant Week a couple of summers ago. B and I ordered from a 3 course tasting menu that was offered; we purposefully chose different menu items so we could taste each others’ meals. For dessert, I ordered banana’s foster, he ordered the bread pudding with ice cream. Up to that point, bread pudding didn’t sound like it could be all that great, yet I was quite curious.

I sampled a bite. It was delicious, in a breakfast meets dessert kind of way.

Continue reading “Cinnamon Bread Pudding”

Tags: bread, cinnamon, custard

Deep. Dark. Decadent.

That pretty much sums up my view of chocolate truffles. I’ve been a chocoholic as far back as I can remember, though my taste in chocolate has certainly matured during that time. Where I once was perfectly happy with a candy bar, now I look for a velvety smoothness that I don’t find in all chocolate.

Don’t think you have to empty your pockets to get good chocolate, however. I am perfectly happy with several of the brands at my local grocery store, including the one I used to make these truffles.

Continue reading “Chocolate Truffles”

Tags: chocolate

For many years, Christmas Day was spent at my aunt and uncle’s house, replete with turkey, mashed potatoes & gravy, and loads of Christmas goodies. (For the record, there were other foods served, but I tend to remember the important ones.) Many of the cookies and confections were also served in my own house, with the exception of one cookie: the pinwheel.

I’m not sure if it’s because pinwheels only came at Christmas, or if it’s because I only had them at my aunt’s, but they’ve long been a favorite of mine. I’ve tried different recipes, finally coming up with a version I liked one year, only to find it disappointing upon making it again. So when I got Martha Stewart’s holiday cookie magazine and saw a recipe for pinwheels, I suspected I wouldn’t be able to resist.

Continue reading “Pinwheel Cookies”

Tags: chocolate, comfort food, cookies, Martha Stewart