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 Christmas memory is about every single Christmas Eve that I spent as a child. My sister and I were the only grandchildren for several years so we got a whole lot of attention from our whole family: 4 grandparents, 12 aunts and uncles, great-grandparents and their 14 children which were obviously my grandaunts and granduncles. We would start the night at my grandparents on my mom’s side with the typical dinner served in almost every single house in Spain: boiled shrimp with green asparagus and mayo, lamb with several sides and the typical Christmas sweets: turrón, mazapán and polvorones. My aunts and uncles at that time were in their early twenties or even teenagers so they would have “great” ideas such as try to get my sister and me drunk or give us cigars to smoke. There was always music and dancing and singing Christmas carols waiting for midnight. Why midnight? Because at my grandparents’ it was baby Jesus who brought the gifts. So at midnight he would be born (placed in his crib in the Nativity scene) and then the presents would appear from out of nowhere. After all that, my grandmother would serve an amazing stock she always prepared and then we would normally go to my great-grandparents. Almost all my dad’s family would be there. Imagine, with 14 kids and almost all of them with more than 3 kids or even 7 like my grandparents, the house was like entering the subway at rush hour. But it was so much fun! Finally my sister and me got to hang out with kids (my father’s cousins) and eat chocolate with bread. And yes, it would continue until 2 or 3 am. What a wonderful time!
Every year my family went to the same Italian restaurant for Christmas Eve. I first began going at two years old. It was and older place with dark chestnut wood, a man playing the a nylon string guitar, red drapery and frost covering the paned windows- truly a memorable quaint christmas experience. Their food way amazing but what was even more amazing was the time shared with family and friends in the restaurant and being able to come back to that year after year. Our last year was when I was twenty-two. I am now twenty-four. My parents have moved and the restaurant is a memory. However I am trying to maintain the tradition that the restaurant came to be but instead of going out to eat my friends and family enjoy my cooking around my table. A tradition lost and a new tradition found. Unfortunately my pasta never turns out as good as theirs!!
My favourite holiday memory is the last one I spent with my Papa. I just remember he was fragile but he was so excited to spend the holiday with us. I have a photo of our time together and I got it framed and have it hanging up to remind me of that special time. I love him and miss him tremendously!
My favorite holiday memory is the year my younger cousin and I got matching everything. We were just over a year apart in age, and both super into American Girl dolls. Our parents and shared set of grandparents got together and bought us each a new doll, handmade a ton of clothes, made matching wooden beds and trunks to store everything in, and surprised us both on Christmas Eve at Grandma’s and Grandpa’s. We were both so excited that we never slept that night. We both stayed up and played with our dolls and all their new goodies all night. By ourselves, in our own homes.
Even today, though I have a strained relationship with my grandparents, I often think back to that Christmas with joy and a heart full of love. And my cousin and I still giggle over how obsessed we were with those dolls, nearly 20 years ago.
Love celebrating the 12 days of Christmas with my family – extending Christmas past December 25th into January. A wonderful way to spend time together.
My favorite holiday memory was when I was about 8 or 9 and had my first experience with snow. We lived in Louisiana at that time so it was a big deal when it snowed! It only really snowed about 1 or 2 inches but it was enough that we were still able to to make a 2 feet snowman. My siblings and I along with my dad had such a great time playing in the snow. After playing in the snow for hours we were treated to a big bowl of pho by my mom.
My favorite Christmas memory is from when I was very young. We were staying at my grandmother’s house in Rhode Island, and there was a loft-style landing just outside the bedrooms that overlooked the the living room. My family always waited until after all us kids had gone to bed on Christmas Eve to put out presents (something my parents still do, actually – I’m 30 and my brother is 26…). I went to bed, and stayed up for hours tricking myself into thinking I could hear sleigh bells. Of course, I woke up at some ungodly hour on Christmas morning. The house was dark except for the Christmas tree, and underneath the tree was this impossible, glittering mountain of presents that seemed to spill out into half of the living room. I felt like I was in the Nutcracker, when Clara creeps out of her room – it’s dark and snowing outside and a spell is cast and suddenly magical things start to happen all around her. It was just so otherworldly and surreal to my little child-brain. I always hope I can find that feeling again for just a second every Christmas.
My favorite holiday memory was with my sister on Christmas Eve when we were little. We were convinced to see Santa that night so we slept in our sleeping bags near the Christmas tree. It was nice to have the Christmas lights on as our nightlight. Of course, we didn’t see Santa because we were exhausted from the day’s activities!
My family and I always cut down our tree, and when I was younger, my older sister and I couldn’t get along long enough to choose a tree. After many tears and mean words, we finally chose one and headed home. After setting up the tree, my mother, who was trying to dance to some Christmas music (she can’t dance- at all), ran into the tree and knocked everything down- onto our cat. Both of them were fine. I don’t remember laughing so hard at anything in all my life.
Favourite holiday memory: heading up north to visit the relatives on their farm for Xmas, and being such a city kid that the hair on the skin of the pork put me off.