It’s giveaway time! It’s a massive one guys and I’m pretty excited! For the past week or so I’ve been featuring recipes using Staub, Shun, Cuttingboard.com, Finex, and Kitchen Aid and now’s the time to finally bundle everything up and give it all away. Well, not literally, because you’re actually going to win new items, so there’s no real bundling, just figurative bundling.
win this staub!
I hope you’ve been following along – so far I’ve made Slow Braised Japanese Chashu Pork, Mini Puff Pastry Roses, Caramel Corn and Rice Krispie Mix, and Mint Snowman Marshmallows, but with these giveaway items you can make pretty much anything, which is perfect for the holiday season.
win this shun knife and cuttingboard.com boo’s block!
I love food – as I’m sure you know – and one of my favorite Christmas memories is of me, my brother, and Christmas chocolates. As little kids, come the first of December, we would get chocolate advent calendars. I still see them around now: those thin cardboard drugstore boxes featuring a Christmas picture with tiny numbered windows and chocolates hiding behind them. My brother and I lived for that moment at the end of the day when we got to pry open the cardboard for our long awaited treat. Our eager fingers would melt the chocolate ever so slightly as we tried to eat our chocolates as slowly as possible.
win this finex cast iron pan!
One year, we got it in our heads that we didn’t want to wait. We snuck our calendars down to the basement – it was cold and dark down there and I didn’t like it but my brother convinced me it was the best place to hide – and ate every single chocolate. We ate the entire month of December. And the thing is, we did it in a gentle, artful way where we could close back the windows so that at a casual glance, you couldn’t tell that the calendar was ravaged.
win this kitchen aid!
Maybe it was the sugar-high making us crazy, but we totally thought we got away with it. That is, until it was time for our nightly ritual with our parents. Needless to say, there was no chocolate treat that night. Or the next night, or the next. But, it was okay, because come Christmas morning, there were still presents under the tree. Apparently, our chocolate binge didn’t leave us on Santa’s naughty list, which was a huge relief, because, presents.
These days I’m more into giving than receiving so I couldn’t resist putting together this giveaway for you! I wish I could send everyone a Christmas present but since I can’t, I thought I’d do the next best thing and giveaway some of my favorite things. So, let me know your favorite holiday memory and maybe you’ll be the lucky reader who wins! Good luck!
Giveaway: I’ve teamed up with some of my favorite brands to do a massive giveaway. One lucky reader will win:
Staub 4 Quart Round Cocotte
Shun 6-inch Dual Core Utility Knife
Cuttingboard.com Boos Block Walnut 20×15 Cutting Board
Finex 10-inch Cast Iron Pan
Kitchen Aid Artisan Design Series 5-Quart Stand Mixer w/Glass Bowl in Pearl Silver
To enter: Leave a comment on the blog with your favorite winter holiday memory. I want to hear ALL the details! I’ll randomly choose a winner and notify them through email. Open to US residents only. (Sorry international friends, only American companies agreed to this one!) If you’d like some extra entries use the widget below to follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. Contest ends December 21st at 12pm PST. Good luck!
The giveaway is closed! I’ll be announcing the winner in the next week or so after reading through all of the comments. Thank you everyone who entered! There are some beautiful memories here!
Update: Congrats Chelsea, you won! Look for an email from me shortly!
My favorite holiday memory, besides the magic of opening the presents, is helping my mom in the kitchen the whole week up until Christmas day. She and I would bake cookies, and bread and plan the menu for Christmas dinner. I remember sitting on the counter as a kid and “stirring” (really eating) the cookie batter all while getting coated in flour. And of course, putting sprinkles on the cookies was always my job. We would wear Santa hats and listen to every Christmas CD we had, and when Jingle Bell Rock came on, I would run around the house dancing and singing. It’s what made Christmas special to me. And to this day, now that I’m older, I still enjoy sitting at the kitchen counter while my mom bakes, stealing pieces of whatever she happens to be making. It will always be my favorite Christmas memory.
My favorite holiday memory was planning the Christmas meals with my mom. We would find recipes we’ve never done before and spend all day destroying the kitchen. Since our English wasn’t great at that time, most of the recipes turned out to be a disaster! It was such an adventure for us and we would laugh the entire time. The first time we tackled flan making, we ended up with something that consisted more of a cheesecake flan but it turned out to be such a hit we make it every year now!
My favorite holiday memory is recreated every year when I fly home to Florida from NYC to spend about a week with my family. I love waking up on Christmas morning to my little brother running to the Christmas tree. It’s amazing to whiteness the true innocence and happiness of Christmas through a child’s eyes. Thank you for hosting this giveaway!
My fave holiday memory is baking and sharing delicious qouian amans on the skating rink my brother made on the lake in front of my parents’ house. We played a round of shinny and the losers had to gulp down a swig of whiskey while the winners took a time out with the buttery pastries. Afterwards we drilled a hole in the ice and did polar dips between sauna sweat sessions. Every year we try to recreate the magic. This year qouian aman will be replaced with my attempt at cruffins. :)
My favorite holiday memory is opening a gift with my son Christmas Eve night.
My favorite holiday memory was going to Oahu with my fiance. It was nice to have time away from all the hustle and bustle and get some quiet time in before the wedding.
We alternated celebrating christmas between my parents house in PA and my aunt’s house in MA, so every other year we would drive half way up on Christmas Eve night and then finish the trip Christmas morning. My mom, dad, sister and I would read christmas books in the hotel bed, and then when we got back in the car christmas morning to finish the trip, there would always be two huge stockings in the back seat of the car! Opening and playing with the goodies would keep my sis and me occupied for the rest of the trip :D
My favourite winter holiday memory only happened last year when my Australian family (mum, dad, and sister) suprised me by flying over for the holidays. They wanted to spend my daughters first Christmas with us as a whole family, enjoying some Texas USA Christmas traditions. We had a wonderful day opening presents, eating amazing food, and enjoying the cold(er) weather. Back home in Australia its summer time at Christmas so seafood and the beach is on the agenda for the day. Here we had a fire outside and enjoyed some hot chocolate. Family near and far is what makes the holidays such a very special time of year.
I love making cookies with family during Christmas. We make lots of cookies, so much that we end up giving most of them away. It is just so much fun spending time with my family making something so simple as cookies.
Everyone always remembers their parent telling them “no” “it’s not safe” or ‘that’s a bad idea” – so my favorite holiday memory involves the time my parents threw caution to the wind. I grew up in suburban NJ, which meant snow, but not a lot. When I was about 10, we had a major snowstorm – there were no cars to be seen and everyone was bundled and tucked away. We had a Blazer with 4 wheel drive. Somehow, and I don’t even remember how it came about, my parents were totally ok with my sister and I attaching a sled to the back of the car, and they dragged us all over the neighborhood for what felt like hours! I can still picture my sister beaming from ear to ear and hear our shrieks of laughter.