Under a Blue Moon

Pâtisserie

(picture ~~stolen~~ borrowed from my sister, Nicole)

Pâtisserie. I do believe that is my new favorite word.

I haven’t said much about the holiday festivities except for the occasional "Phew! Tree is up." or "Phew! Tree is down." post. I spent the greater part of my vacation (12/21-1/7 so still in progress) sick as a dog. My body is wont to do that – as soon as I am free of any professional obligations all manner of previously intimidated viruses and bacteria feel free to have a party at my place. Whoohoo! Party at Andrea’s. Literally.

I did manage to pull it together and invite myself down to my sister and brother in law’s house the weekend after Christmas. Rick and I drove down on Saturday morning and just as soon as we arrived we hopped into my brother is law’s car and headed into Pacific Grove to pick up fish for the evening meal and a secret stop at Gerard Bechler’s Pâtisserie for a certain someone’s birthday dessert. Certain someone being Rick, before you all start sending me birthday salutations. I’m aging fast enough, thank you very much.

My sister and brother in law (Dennis) met the man before the baker, if you will. Meaning they met him socially and became friends with him and he just happens to be an amazing pastry chef. Pastry Chef – now there is a friendship I would definitely cultivate. It’s almost as good as a – – – hmm. I can’t think of anything better. When we went to pick up the dessert Gerard wasn’t there but oh my the dessert was.

I’ve been hearing stories for years now of parties where Gerard brought some amazing confection for all the guests – towering crouque-en-bouche (see image above), individual chocolate lanterns with actual candles burning inside, artists being inspired to do his likeness in chocolate after eating one of his desserts. And now we had one of our very own to enjoy.

I cannot describe how good it was – it was a vanilla custard surrounded by individual cream puffs, drizzled in caramelized spun sugar and topped with fresh berries. We ate our amazing dinner of fresh fish tacos and drank tons of wine and then each took a modest portion of dessert. Lots of moaning ensued and then there was a total loss of decorum and we just passed the cake plate around and each took a turn basically licking it clean.

The next morning we drove back into Pacific Grove and decided to have breakfast at Gerard’s. Well he does quiche just as amazingly as he does desserts. Dennis and I had spinach quiche while Nicki and Rick had ham and cheese. It was just more custardy than other quiche I’ve ever had. And as a bonus Gerard himself was there and came out and visited with us for a few minutes. The holidays are his busiest time and I’m sure the Sunday before New Year’s was no exception. After we ate our quiche and drank our coffee and piled into the car Gerard came out to the parking lot with a small china dish with four perfect chocolate truffles to see us on our way.

Can you even imagine a better way to end the year? I’m not sure I can. Gerard is on a much deserved holiday in France and I, along with most of the rest of you, am on a diet. So when I am enjoying my steamed vegetables and salt-free broth I am going to dream of cream puffs, flaky pastry and sea breezes.

Beginnings

There is something just so deliciously clean slate-ish about January 1st. You can dust off your hands of the previous year, straighten your shoulders with firm resolve and not look back.

The new year is full of hope and plans and dreaminess. I’m not much of a resolution maker because, well, it’s just never really worked out for me. I’m more of a "I’m really going to TRY…." type of person. I have the standard issue health and finance related goals but more than that this year I am going to try to be more creative.

I buy all this stuff, the bits and pieces, and make half hearted attempts and what usually stalls me is that I can’t quite get to my vision. And I’m not a very patient person. My Christmas cards are a perfect example. I was going for something kind of sweet and simple and instead they just looked hokey to me. Instead of trying out different versions of it I just shoved it all into my craft closet and that was that.

I have boxes and bags of stuff shoved into my craft closet. The above is just a small sampling.

What interests me most is altered art. There is stamp shop near me in Roseville that has an example of a small shadow box with an apothecary theme that just fascinates me. It has a teeny little skeleton, small little jars, all manner of things you can imagine would be in an apothecary’s shop. That’s the sort of thing I would love to create. Little intriguing vignettes.

The second thing that, well I’m not sure if ‘interests me’ is the right term – more like ‘frustrates me to no end’ and that is photography. I have a decent camera and I don’t know how to use it properly. A class may be in order. I did receive a digital photography book for Christmas and I’ll start there. I suppose the instruction manual that came with the camera is another good place to start.

So there you have it – more creativity and the pictures to prove it.

And I’m going to TRY to be better about posting. I don’t know what happened in the last couple of months but it sure didn’t lend itself to blogging. Less of that.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to those near and far! I hope that 2008 is everything you hope it to be and more.

I’m looking forward to some big changes in the upcoming year. A new home, a renewed sense of calm and gratitude and just a bit less stress than the year we are leaving behind.

May the year be rosy and bright for you.

Undecking the halls

Okay out with all the red, green, gold and glitter. It’s time to undecorate.

The tree is only partially done but I’ve gathered up all the other various bits and pieces of holiday litter (it starts to look like litter after 12/26) and put it away. I’m in the mood for white, cream and pale green.

Someone should have told my nose Christmas was over. It has just gotten into the holiday spirit and is doing its very best impression of Rudolph. I caught a bit of a cold during the festivities. My body betrays me like that – as soon as I have some time off of work it decides to come down with something. Never fails.

Well I should finish up the tree so I can vacuum up the last of the glitter. I think it’s time to undecorate when the ornaments start taking themselves off the tree. Every now and then a tired, dried out branch just can’t hold on to its ornament anymore and it slides off with a little thump on the carpet.

Happy Unholiday Everyone!

Holiday Hoopla

I was tagged by the lovely Jill from Bailiwick Designs – but silly me – I was way behind on my email and blog reading and didn’t notice until a couple of days ago. The rules state that I need to specifically tag two others (rather than the vague ‘if you want to participate consider yourself tagged’) but since the holidays are practically over I’m not going to tag anyone.

Here are 12 random, Christmas related things about me.

When I was about 5 I wanted more than anything a Betsy Wetsy type doll. When I got up and Christmas morning and saw her under the tree I was so overcome I had to go back to bed for a while.

When I had my very first Christmas tree I bought these cheap plastic icicles to hang on the tree. I still have them and use them every year. They are actually quite pretty.

I have a little ceramic bluebird that I always put on the top most branch of the tree.

My favorite Christmas carol is Little Drummer Boy. I especially like this David Bowie/Bing Crosby version. Probably because it’s just so weird.

Before I was married and had children my friend and I would get together on Christmas eve and drink and make anatomically correct gingerbread men.

I always make my Dad a crab omelet on Christmas day.

Normally I always make a cinnamon pull apart for Christmas breakfast but this year I’ve decided to buck tradition and make a blueberry crumb cake from Ina Garten’s Barefoot Contessa at Home.

I tend to go non-traditional with my Christmas wrap (except for last year I actually did red and green). This year it is pale blue, silver and white.

Last year was the first time I ever saw A Christmas Carol.

I’ve seen the San Francisco Ballet Nutcracker four times since 1986.

My mother in law gave my husband two beautiful hand blown Christmas ornaments from when he was a child and I BROKE one of them. You cannot even imagine my despair.

Nothing looks more tired to me than a Christmas tree on December 26th. I tend to undecorate as soon as possible.

There you have it! Happy Christmas Eve everyone!

Now what….

This is an interesting development. I’m ready. Presents are all wrapped and under the tree. The house is clean. Everything sparkles and smells nice.

And it is three entire days before Christmas. I got kind of a late start out the gate this year but everything just fell into place. The parking fairies were even on my side.

Normally I’m plagued with Christmasy nightmares of realizing it’s Christmas day and I’ve completely forgotten to buy any gifts and I’m frantically going up and down the aisles of 7-11 trying to find something that isn’t a dusty can of baked beans or 10-40w motor oil to give as gifts.

I was a wee bit tardy getting to the post office this year. I showed up on Wednesday morning to mail off a package to a certain 53575 zip code (Ahem. Please tell me it arrived and fluff the bows, will you) and there were only two people in line ahead of me. I remarked upon this to the postmistress and she just looked sternly at me over the top of her glasses and said "that’s because everyone else has already mailed their packages." Whoops.

Next year I am going to forgo ribbon embellished with glitter. It as insidious as confetti. I’ll be sweeping and vacuuming glitter until Labor Day. And you think I’m exaggerating. One year we had a New Year’s Eve party (back when we could actually stay up past 11:00pm) and someone brought confetti. I was finding that confetti for YEARS afterward. We even moved and I was vacuuming it up in the NEW house. Explain that one.

Well now I’m going to make myself a Christmas Cosmo, put my feet up and just enjoy the tree for a few days. I wish for all of you peace and joy. Merry Christmas.

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