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Moana Party, Our Way (A Little Less “Disney” And A Lot More “Luau”)

August 15, 2017

I am 100% on board with every single thing about the movie Moana - seriously, THANK YOU Disney for fiiiiiinally giving us a heroine that we can all get our daughters on board with - and was more than happy to make my daughter's third birthday party Moana-themed, per her request. I was not, however, super psyched about the idea of making my house look like the Summer Blowout aisle at Party City. I mean, surely there was a way to evoke the whole Polynesian-adventure thing without breaking napkins decorated with The Rock (or at least his animated counterpart). ...No?

Here's how we de-Disneyfied our Moana party (while still making all those three-year-old dreams come true).

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Entertaining

The Great (And Much-Anticipated) Moana Cake

August 14, 2017
how to make a moana theme birthday cake out of fondant

A few months ago, I asked my daughter what was wanted for her third birthday - fully aware, of course, that she was going to change her mind approximately 1,352,534 times before the day actually arrived.

"Moana cake," she said. Like, immediately, with zero pause for contemplation. "And candy."

Very well.

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Entertaining

Fresh Texture

August 11, 2017

A friend from the East Coast came to visit a couple of weeks ago, and over dinner she told me that the one thing of mine she really, really covets is my "dish situation" (by which she meant my collection of serving platters and wine glasses and plates and such).

With zero humility, I have to say: I love the collection I’ve amassed over the years. It includes everything from Noritake dinnerware classics (featured in this post; you can see the collection I curated for the brand here) to vintage finds from all over the country, and is constantly evolving as I discover new style pairings that feel fresh. That’s my favorite thing about my collection, actually: every few seasons, I step back and look at it, think about if and how I want to switch it up, and then simply mix a few new pieces to create a completely new look.

Take the tablescape pictured here, for example, which started with a bunch of pieces I already owned:

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Eat

How To Make Sauce With Tomatoes From Your Garden

August 4, 2017

Here is an annoying thing I do whenever people come over to visit: I drag them to my side yard so that I can show off my tomato plants and loudly exclaim "how wonderful it is to have tomatoes straight from your own garden!"

Isn't that SO ANNOYING?! I can't help it. Before we moved to California I'd never grown tomatoes, and for whatever reason having everything to do with luck and nothing whatsoever to do with my abilities, the tomato vines that I plant every summer grow into freaking trees within weeks. I mean it: they are massive, and so heavy that they can't be contained by ordinary tomato plant container-things, and end up spilling out into the path, and it's all very dramatic and smells AMAZING.

The thing is, I'm soooo good at tomato-growing that I always end up with way more tomatoes than we can reasonably eat. I send my kids out into the yard to gather them up every night, but still: the branches are practically been hanging to the ground from all the weight. So the other night, I decided it was time to do something that'd use up massive quantities of them in a way that would still let their flavor come through, and made marinara sauce using a combination of heirlooms and cherry tomatoes - basically, whatever was ripe.

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Eat

Bagel Snob

July 28, 2017

When I was growing up, New York City bagels were a "thing." You just couldn't get anything even approximating one once you left the boundaries of the city. People continue to act like they're still a thing, but by now Noah's and Einstein's and similar chains have made their way across the country, and while they're not anywhere near as good as an H&H Bagel straight out of the oven (I used to live a couple of blocks from the factory and walk over for a fresh bagel with cream cheese and lox on cold mornings, and oh my godddd), they're certainly acceptable. Even delicious.

But still: not the same. And since I don't have a solid bagel place anywhere within a twenty-minute driving range, I just don't really eat them very much anymore. This is obviously a shame.

Then my friend Alisa told me that she makes her own bagels. I mean...who does that? That is an insane thing to do. (I actually consider any bread-making an insane thing to do, since - as you may recall - I am oh, so very bad at it.) So she said she'd show me how she does it, using a recipe from Sophisticated Gourmet, and now...well, ok, I'm not going to make these myself, because I am wayyyyy too lazy and impatient for a recipe that involves yeast and waiting. But anytime someone wants to make them for me, I'll be right there, cream cheese in hand.

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