Holiday Entertaining with Italpasta

I love hosting people at our condo! Large gatherings, dinners, sleepovers... you'd be surprised at how many people we can fit in our tiny 600 square foot condo.

While every occasion is a delight for us, December is where everything comes full circle and we love to have intimate dinner parties with our friends to enjoy good food, drinks and conversation. It's also a great way to wrap up the year!

Entertaining can be both fun and stressful. Lucky for us, Italpasta made the process a lot easier with their incredible offerings that inspired us to create quick recipes for a dinner.

Jamesie's Almond Date Scones

Last weekend I woke up to my condo smelling like sweet cinnamon and baking; I knew James was up to something! He spent the morning baking these delicious almond date scones, a recipe he dreamed up and brought to life. We were both so pleased with how they turned out, we decided to make them again a couple of days ago!

I'd happily invite you over to come and share a batch with us, but they never last! These soft, buttery balls of baked dough are easy to make and an absolute treat to share with a group of friends.

Mm Mm Candied Almond Biscotti

Well, this is a little awkward. You thought you clicked the wrong blog, didn't you?

I promise, it's still me here, Anum from SummerxSkin. I'm super excited to introduce a new category today and it's going to be all about FOOD. Every Friday, you can come here to find a new recipe that has been tried, tasted, touched up and perfected. Maybe we can call it Food Friday? TGIFood? I'll try to think of a better name...

To be completely transparent, I originally started this blog thinking it would be a great way for me to teach myself how to cook and share my learnings with you. Of course that didn't work out as planned and instead, I eventually married my husband who is an INCREDIBLE cook. He prepares almost 100% of our meals, but I've always been the better baker (shh, don't tell him that). It works out well because he will make dinner and I sweeten things up with dessert! He'll be helping me with this series and together, we will share AWESOME recipes with you + tips and tricks from the expert himself. Let me know what you think of the first one!

Welcoming 2013

 

 (Photos by James)

Every year I host a Pre-New Years Bash at my house and invite a small group of close girlfriends. We usually have a potluck and do Secret Santa, exchanging gifts after enjoying a nice dinner. I started this tradition back in 2010 as a way to see them one last time before the year ended, but now it seems we also manage to spend New Years Eve together as well - which is amazing.

This was the third year and I decided to take charge and make it a little different with a Mexican feast. I was able to make this happen thanks to James, also known as The Guerrilla Gourmet, who gave up his entire Sunday to help me cook the meal while I prepared the smaller items, set up the table and did other things around the house.

In the midst of entertaining and eating I tried to get a few photos of the evening to share with you!

 

This is what the table looked like. For appetizers we had homemade tortilla chips and different kinds of dips including salsa, spicy avocado dip (almost like guacamole), and a layered 3-cheese, salsa and sour cream baked dip.

 

A photo of my lovely girlfriends right before we devoured everything.

 

You can see the burritos on the top right - we had many different kinds! If you're looking for a recipe, try this one. They are super filling and really yummy.

 

I prepared the Mexican rice from scratch.

 

This is what the homemade salsa looked like, it was sweet, tangy and delicious!

 

The avocado dip was sour and spicy... I practically ate this as my meal, it was so so good. 

 

Another group photo right before everyone headed home.

I forgot to get photos of dessert, but I opted for apple crumble with vanilla ice cream, as we didn't have enough time to make churros.

I hope you all had an amazing holiday and have a fantastic year ahead of you. I'd love to know what your resolutions are for 2013!