White Elephants and Tasty Bites

The same night that my parent's hosted their family Christmas Party, I had my annual friend Christmas with a White Elephant gift exchange.My friend's hosted it in the gorgeous house in Vernon and they supplied a few eats while the rest of us all brought things to share.

I don't remember everything that was out on the buffet, but the kitchen was filled with food. Here's a dabbling and please forgive me if I forgot an item or two. I was in a food coma shortly after arrival and may have forgotten everything I ate:

Meatballs
Bacon-wrapped water chestnuts
Oven-baked ham and swiss/cheddar sandwiches (Recipe Below)
Southwest Egg Rolls
Fruit Skewers
Cheesey-jalepeno dip
Cake balls
Bagel Dip (Recipe Below)

Raspberry pretzel bars (Recipe Below)
Cheesecake
Gingerbread cookies
Chinese noodle salad
Antipasta Skewers

And of course we all had plenty of drinks and supplies. There was Jack Daniels Apple Cider, X-Rated and Red Bull for our lady quick-drinks, Amaretto and Sour, Captain & Bacardi Rum and Coke, tons of beer, wine, champagne - yes we love our cocktails!

The drinks help the best come out in all of us for our annual White Elephant gift exchange.

Here's how we work our gift exchange.
1) Each person that wants to participate brings  at least one White Elephant gift.
2) All gifts are to come wrapped and added to the pile in the middle of the room.
3) The participants sit around the gift pile in a circle.
4) Each person rolls the pair of dice one time in hopes of getting doubles.
    a) If doubles are obtained, a gift is chosen from under the table or a person is allowed to steal a gift from someone else that has one already.
    b) If doubles aren't obtained, the dice travel to the next person.
5) All gifts stay wrapped for the length of the game.
6) The game ends when the last gift is removed from the middle pile.
7) Not everyone will get a gift and some will have multiple gifts to open. 
8) Everyone that has a gift, opens their gift and laughs at what they received.

Some of the gifts that were received this year include: Unicorn Meat, Beer Brewing Kit, 20 used DVDs, batman puzzle, coal, coffee warmer, massage kit, white trash barbie (she made her return since she was brought into the game in 2012 and was a hit then - it's the cheapest looking knock-off barbie: eye makeup on her cheek, chest and arms are two different shades of skin, legs are way too skinny, dress is put together with mismatched velcro), a colossal TV remote, mini alcohol bottles, and more.

And my favorite gift of all was the one I received (obviously). I got a Wine-O bag - which is an insulated, reuseable brown paper bag to carry my wine in. It's so perfect for me and the person that brought it was hoping I would pick it. Sometimes life is funny how that works out.


I plan to have my recipes in printable formats in 2015 - something that will come along with a few blog upgrades that I have planned. So please bear with these recipes as they are.

Bagel Dip - From the kitchen of Caroline

1 c Mayonnaise

1 c Sour cream

4 oz. of thinly sliced deli beef or corn beef (Mom always uses 2 packages of original Budding Beef)

2 tsp. dried dill weed 2 tbs. dried parsley

1 tsp dried minced onion

1 bag of bagels

Cut up beef into small pieces.  Mix all ingredients together and set in fridge over night.  It is VERY important that you let it sit for several hours in order for flavors to marry, or it won't taste right.  Tear bagels into small pieces and serve with dip.

Oven Baked Ham Sandwiches- from the kitchen of Caroline via a Facebook recipe

2 - 12 oz. pks of Sweet Hawaiian rolls (the small dinner roll size)
1 1/2 lbs. of Virginia ham (NOT honey ham)
6 slices of swiss cheese
6 slices of cheddar cheese
1 stick of real butter
2 tsp. Worchestershire sauce
1 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. onion powder
1 tsp. poppy seeds

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Place the bottoms of the 24 rolls into 2 9X13 pans. Place ham on the rolls in each pan. Cut the cheese slices into 4 parts and place 2 small pieces on each sandwich. (I suggest keeping swiss with swiss and cheddar with cheddar, but go wild and mix it up if you want). Cover with the tops of the buns. In a sauce pan, mix butter, Worchestershire sauce, garlic powder, onion powder and poppy seeds. Wait until all the butter is melted and then brush the melted butter over the ham sandwiches. Cover with foil and refrigerate for 1 hour or over night - or bake right away. Bake for 15 minutes or until cheese is melted and serve.
  

Raspberry Pretzel Bars - from the kitchen of Sam

Crust:
1 1/2 c. crushed pretzels (using a ziploc bag and crushing with a rolling pin works best)
3/4 c. melted butter
3 Tbsp. sugar

Add pretzels, butter and sugar together in a bowl and then transfer to a 9X13 pan and bake at 350 for 10 minutes. Let cool before you add the other layers. 

Middle: 
1 8oz. pkg. cream cheese
1 c. powdered sugar
1 8oz. tub cool whip

Blend cream cheese and powdered sugar together. Fold in cool whip. Spread on top of cooled crust. 

Topping:
1 large pkg. raspberry jello
2 c. water
12 oz. frozen raspberries

Boil water and mix in jello. Let cool slightly then add frozen raspberries. This sets the jello. Pour on top of the cream cheese mixture and spread around evenly. Put in the fridge to set for at least an hour before serving.         

Wauk Wednesday: La Estacion

Just last week, I was asked about brunches in Waukesha via Twitter. Thankfully, I used my Groupon for La Estacion a few weeks back and did a brunch with my friend Tiffany. We weren't sure what to expect, but drove on over and hoped not to wait too long.

La Estacion is located just south of downtown Waukesha by the train tracks that divide the city in two. It's the former train depot and has many images in it from days gone by. They have great Mexican food, margaritas and a great summer patio. 

When I arrived, I waited for Tiffany in the bar area and noticed a lot of really long tables full of parties enjoying the brunch. When Tiffany arrived, they sat us in one of the trolley cars. I was a little hesitant at first because someone leaving said that they could barely feel their legs after eating in a car, but we must have been sat in the warm one as I was nice and toasty.

These are legit old train cars that have been re-purposed, while still on the tracks that run through Waukesha. They have tables and booths and lots of light through all the windows. The original shades are still intact, but non-functioning. From our table, I could see the pancake, waffle and egg stations, as well as one of the buffets.

We were instantly greeted by a cheery server who told us briefly about the brunch and told us to have at it. So we did as we were told and headed out of the train car and down to the brunch.

We were instantly overwhelmed but in a good way. We wandered around the seven tables (yes seven!!!) full of food and had no idea where to start. We asked a gentleman that was filling up his plate what was the best and he told us the shrimp plates were the best thing. We looked it over and decided that would be plate two!

I started with one of the buffet carts and filled my plate with steak & mole sauce, steak, peppers & cheese, zucchini pudding, bacon and a strawberry goat cheese salad. I ate everything up and the steak with mole was the only thing that I wasn't a fan of. I'm not sure what sort of meat it was, but I just didn't like the texture. The zucchini pudding was amazing. It tasted like eggs and finely chopped zucchini, cream, salt and pepper.

Plate two was mostly consumed with a made-just-for-me belgium waffle. I put some fresh fruit on it and tried to get some syrup on it, but the container was hard to poor from. I went back for more zuchinni pudding and then some fiesta potatoes and melon. The dessert table was calling my name, but I held off.

Before heading back to the train car, we headed over to the shrimp station to see what it was all about. There were two different shrimp dishes to choose from. I chose shrimp with tequila and orange over rice and Tiffany chose shrimp and cheese over rice. We watched as the shrimp were sauteed in a pan and then with mine having tequila in it, it was set on fire briefly to meld the flavors.

We then headed back to our table, ordered two mimosas and dug in. The shrimp was by far the most amazing thing that I have had on a brunch. The flavors were so fresh. Tiffany agreed about the flavors and we definitely want to go back for nothing more than 12 plates of that!

We never made it to the dessert table as we began catching up and chitty-chatting our way through our last plates. The mimosas were wonderful after the meal while we continued to chat.

I highly recommend this brunch, but it is a little hard to get around when it's crowded because the tables are in U-shapes. But if you don't mind a little wait for the food, it's worth every bite.

Other great area brunches are People's Park and Thunder Bay Grill.