As far back as I can remember, my dad's family has had a tradition of making Whiskey Sour Punch at our annual Christmas gathering -- often an open-house style get together on Christmas Eve, filled with food, family, fun, laughter and songs.

It was my Grandpa's recipe, and it was one of the recipes that he submitted for the Family Recipes booklet that they published and handed out to family in the year that I was born. Coincidence? I think not.  Although my Grandpa is no longer with us, this drink is a tradition that the family carries on each year.

A couple of years ago, I decided to bring this tradition over to Tom's family.  I have also started including it in my Halloween Party repertoire.  It tastes great and seems to appeal to most people.  It's citrusy, punchy, not overly sweet.

I'm not sure if it's the old age kicking in or what, but I had a bit of a brain fart at the grocery store yesterday.  I knew I had seen a recipe on Pinterest that I wanted to try that was some sort of Asian / Ramen noodle bowl.  It sounded like a fairly simple weeknight dinner, and had to stop by the grocery store on my way home anyways, so I could pick up whatever other ingredients I needed.  Of course, being in a hurry, I only glanced at the recipe and quick got what I thought I needed.  Upon arriving home and attempting to cook said meal, I suddenly realized that I had saved and confused two separate, though similar recipes (one was actually ramen soup, the other was a linguine noodle bowl) -- and the ingredients I had on hand were a blend of the two.  So, what's a girl to do?  Yep, use what you've got and with the power of two recipes combined...we have: Sriracha Ramen Noodle Bowl!  I think I actually picked out the best parts of each recipe, and I was pleased with the results!  Tom liked it, too -- but beware: it's fairly spicy. Adjust to your own tastes.

With Thanksgiving this past week and Christmas around the corner, I've been in a festive mood lately.  We didn't travel over the holiday weekend so it allowed me the chance to have some good downtime and also do some experimenting in the kitchen!  I've been spending [too much] time getting ideas from Pinterest, and I came across this recipe for Cranberry and Pomegranate Bruschetta, which I decided to adapt...and use at least three different ways!  All of these make would make a great addition to a Thanksgiving or Christmas gathering and will add some festive holiday cheer!

We'll start with the primary recipe.

Pomegranate Cranberry Crostini

When we first moved into our house 5 years ago, I noticed that we had a crabapple tree in our side yard. Some years it has bloomed beautifully and produced a good amount of apples; other years, it hasn't done much. The deer frequently come up to munch on the dropped apples or eat them right off the tree (like last winter when there were somehow still apples on the tree in February??) We trimmed back a bunch of the branches last year and the apples came in full force this year. Tom and I had discussed doing something with them rather than letting them go to waste, but crabapples are quite sour. Tom had though about making a hard sour cider out of them; looking up crabapple recipes was still on my to-do list. A friend was over recently and asked about the tree. She said she had a recipe for a crabapple cobbler -- so I decided, why not try it?  We picked a few of the better looking apples and started chopping them up. After taste testing a few, I came to a shocking conclusion: these were not crabapples after all -- they were real, regular, sweet apples! Although, I still don't know what variety they are...

I decided to be brave tonight and try something new for dinner: Eggplant Parmesan.  Some friends of ours made it for us not too long ago (although, a vegan version), and it was actually quite good.  I wasn't sure that I had ever actually had eggplant before.  For whatever reason, it just always sounded like something that would taste bad.  After my first exposure, however, I realized I might actually like eggplant!  I was at the grocery store today, not really sure what I wanted to make for dinners this week, when I stumbled upon eggplant in the produce section.  I make Chicken Parmesan from time to time, so I figured I could just replace the chicken with eggplant and that could be dinner tonight!  Eggplant is a little different than chicken, so here's the recipe I made up: