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 is the Christmas we gave our kids new bikes. The looks on their faces….priceless! We all still talk about that Christmas and how DH and I managed to secret away 4 bikes and then surprise them. Not easy with 4 kids and one of them being super snoopy! We all still love watching the videos of our Christmas mornings and now we’re getting to share those same videos with grandkids. I love it!
Decorating sugar cookies for hours and hours on end…using the most intricate designs and making sure each cookies was as flourished as possible. My younger brother and sister wanted to be finished after 30 minutes, but I insisted they sit until each cookie was finished.
They hate decorating cookies today. They even hate eating them.
I’m Jewish and never celebrated Christmas growing up. I lived in a neighborhood in Maryland that was within walking distance of a Catholic school and a Lutheran school. In fact, the Lutheran school principal lived next door. Almost all of my friends in the neighborhood attended either of the private schools while I walked just over a mile each day to the public elementary school. I was so, so jealous of all the Christmas fanfare and in those days, even the classrooms in public schools were all decked out for Christmas. I too wanted to believe in Santa. While my parents wanted to continue to share only the simple beauty of Hanukkah, they did allow my Barbie dolls to celebrate Christmas. What a fun time I had decorating a tiny artificial Christmas tree for my Barbie dollhouse and wrapping up the smallest boxes my mother could find in Christmas wrap to put under that tree. My father helped me string lights around the dollhouse. Allowing Barbie to be Christian and having my parents understand how important that was to me is one of my favorite memories of the season.
My favorite memory was getting up on Christmas morning, opening gifts and then meeting all my aunts, uncles, and cousins at Grandma’s for breakfast. After all of us cousins are done eating we had to wait “forever” it seemed for the adults to get done eating and then Grandma would pull out her homemade sticky rolls. Boy did we love those rolls!!! I miss those days and my Grandma so much! Winning that mixer would help me learn to make those sticky rolls for my family and create a new Christmas memory for my family!
My favorite holiday memory is decorating sugar cookies and ginger bread people.
I could tell you about the Christmas morning when I was so excited that I threw up all over the Christmas tree, but I won’t. Here is the tale of Christmas Eve 1981 instead. Because my nurse mom was scheduled to work Christmas Day, our little family planned to celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve instead. That night, after the sun went down, Grandma casually announced that she would like to take a drive through town to look at all of the pretty house lights. Grandpa — who was generally bitchy about the holidays anyway — said: “No, you all go out and do that. I will stay here and take a nap because I’m tired.” Everyone but Grandpa bundled up and piled into the station wagon and went for a peaceful drive through the snow. When we got back, I discovered that Santa had come to visit our house early! All these beautifully wrapped presents had magically appeared, the family dogs Floyd & Gypsy had big red bows on their collars, and Santa had left me a special letter. I could not believe that Grandpa had slept through Santa’s visit, especially the sound of reindeer on the roof… I was the only kid in the house, and I love remembering all of the trouble my family went to to make the holiday special for me, especially Grandpa, who overcame his crotchety holiday attitude long enough to play Santa for me to great effect. My grandpa, who barely tolerated Christmas, ended up dying a few years later on December 22nd — a final bah-humbug statement that we all chuckle about even after all these years. Such great memories.
My favorite holiday memory is when my girlfriend and I cooked together for thanksgiving. We invited a bunch of friends who didn’t have families living nearby and were going to spend holiday alone. It was a blast and everyone brought food even thought it wasn’t required. We had so much great food and it was a great time! Definitely a wondrous experience
My favorite holiday memory is when my girlfriend and I cooked together for thanksgiving. We invited a bunch of friends who didn’t have families living nearby and were going to spend holiday alone. It was a blast and everyone brought food even thought it wasn’t required. We had so much great food and it was a great time! Definitely a wondrous experience!
I was born in Vietnam during the war so my holiday memories (from a Western calendar standpoint anyway) consists mostly of my father coming home from military leave and making sure that the kids submit a list of toys that they want from Pere Noel. My father would then take the list, read it, and burn it just like the offering to Ông Táo. The toys weren’t much (dolls or plastic guns) but our eyes lit up and we played with them until they broke. Most importantly, we were just happy to have Dad home.
My father passed away on Christmas day last year and truthfully all I want, and all that our family wants is to have Dad here with us again.
Have a great holiday season!
One of my favorite memories was always my family’s Christmas Eve party. My mother would host all of my parents friends & neighbors at our house on Christmas Eve. The days leading up to the party were always so hectic, especially the day of the party. Once it hit dusk, it was my job to go outside with a lighter and light all the candles we had set up so guests could find their way. Afterwards, my sister and I would go upstairs to my room (because it had the best view) and watch for cars to pull into our driveway. his was a tradition I am most fond of this year because this will be the first year my sister is not spending Christmas Eve or Christmas Day with us. It’s going to be different, but I’m so pleased to have these lovely memories to think back on. We were also in charge of filming the night too, we used one of those video recorders that still had TAPES, tapes! One Christmas Eve it started snowing as everyone was leaving & I can remember the feeling of excitement just bubbling over & waking up the next morning with a light dusting of snow on Christmas morning.