Pork and Pancakes for Christmas

I know most food blogs post lots of recipes over the holidays for the benefit of their readers.


With baby Rachel: check out those aunt-ing skillz

Well this blog is for me, and I was busy. This is not to say you should not read my entires. In fact, I welcome it, and it truly encourages me. However, if I thought about this blog as a responsibility, it would never have lasted as long as it has. When I get busy, the blog takes a backseat. When I am bored, it keeps my occupied. The most important part of all is it keeps me cooking, and maybe...just maybe it gets you to cook too. Like this:



I usually stay pretty busy when I come to Florida for the holidays. I try to spend some quality time with my friends and family that I rarely get to see during the year. This Christmas, I got to see my whole Puerto-Rican Style family for Christmas Eve and then my brother's family for Christmas Day. I even got to spend some time with my boyfriend's family the day after. Nothing made me happier than to see so many people I love in the short time I have here. A highlight included my aunt Janet's new fluffy black dog, Diva. See if you can spot her sandwiched between our dark curly hair in the pictures below:




My Aunt Janet makes flavorful, tender Puerto-Rican style pork every year for Christmas Eve dinner, but this year was absolutely, by far THE. BEST. PORK. I. HAVE. EVER. HAD. I couldn't stop eating it. I wish I could pass along her wisdom with a simple recipe and a little story, but this is something that comes with years of practice, trial, error and patience.

We had another pork the next night for Christmas night which we shared with my sister-in-law's wonderful family. Then it was time for dessertland.



Geeze.

Now, I have never bothered to includes ads on my blog because I don't know that I have all that many readers. However, I am going to go ahead and personally endorse my first product.



Without this product's knowledge or approval I am going to crown it the official pancake accessory of Bite Me Food Blog. It was gift for my sister-in-law who makes pancakes about 100% more than I ever do. The pancake pen jumped out at me when I was skimming through a magazine one day months ago. It worked far better than I ever imagined it would, and it was a blast to use to amuse my 4-year-old niece:




Check out the cutie presenting the plates with her sister's name on them. Poor Charlotte's name is too long so she just got a "C".

She was super impressed up until the point where I could not be precise enough to give Minnie Mouse a bow between her ears; she had to settle for a blue berry bow after being plated.

I am not going to supply you with a fantastic pancake recipe here because to be honest, I cared very little about the taste of the pancakes and more about the fun we would have making them. I used the "just add water kind" and attempted to cover it up with an array of toppings and mix-ins. I call it "pancake bar": chocolate chips, blueberries, bananas, pecans and any combo you can think of. I ended up with a choco-banana-nut pancake, and I must say the letter "A" (or whatever letter I had) never tasted so good.

I don't really have a recipe for you, just a couple tips. Consider them a late Christmas present: #1 buy the pancake pen if you or someone you know have kids who could get a kick out of it and #2 make the lost of your left overs.



Number 2 might hit home specifically to my brother and sister-in-law who like us, must have at least 4 to 5 pounds of pork left over from Christmas dinner. Of course, you don't want to get stuck eating the same thing every night just to avoid the guilt of throwing something perfectly good away later. It is important to get creative with leftovers, especially when you have a ton of the same thing (this might be a familiar Thanksgiving situation including turkey instead of pork). This year, I decided to use some of the pork leftovers to make BBQ pulled pork sandwiches.



It was simple to shred the meaty pieces into smaller ones and reheat with plenty of brown sugar BBQ sauce, slap it on a bun, and call it a good ole' American meal. Another use of the pork was just as part of a salad that included dried cranberries, feta cheese, apple slices and walnuts. Considering we originally enjoyed the pork as an authentic Puerto-Rican style dish, the variations so far have been different enough to keep the meal "fresh" in my mind. What's next? Pork enchiladas? sweet and sour pork? Pork Pancakes?

Change Up: Brunch Club October

Some things never change; more things do.



October brunch was at Sube's last year. We feasted on a silly amount of food, and then we carved pumpkins. There were mounds of orange goop in large bowls on the table as each of us carved our own pumpkins with an unnecessary level of concentration. This year was to be a repeat. Sube was hosting again, and brunch was to be followed by the carving of pumpkins.

While I would call the brunch another wonderful brunch success, there was an epic pumpkin carving fail. I believe Andace brought one small pumpkin. Stanley tried to eat the stem, but gave up probably once he realized it tasted like a tree. Once brunch was cleared from the table, the pumpkin tools were brought out, but no one moved. We continued our amusing conversation about what horror movie character Sue should be for Halloween at the school where she teaches and the fact that she and Natalie's dad bears a strong resemblance (at least in his facebook picture) to US House Minority Leader, John Boehner. To illustrate, two of the three pictures below are the real John Boehner; one is Sue and Natalie's dad:





Anyway, we all were so distracted by good food and conversation that the single small innocent pumpkin was spared.

Besides the absence of pumpkin carving, there are quite a few things that have changed just since the last October Brunch (2009), hosted by Sube:

*Candace and Andy tied the knot in a backyard ceremony at Andy's parents' Canadian home.
*Zach and I adopted our Greyhound, Stanley and moved into a new, much bigger apartment and are each in different jobs.
*Elliott moved to LA and got a cool new job.
*Emily and Rob got engaged!
*Natalie moved into a great Loz Feliz Apartment on her own and seems to have made more friends than people I have even met in LA.
*Brian got a great job, and Sue gave us the "two year warning" that babies would be on the way!
*Even though Three-Hole-Punch (Sube's little dog) gained weight since last year, she looks smaller to me now that I am used to Stanley.

If you ask me, these are all great changes. This stage of life is so fascinating to me. Change is not only rapid, it is significant. People are going from boyfriend/girlfriend to husband/wife, jobs that will direct the course of our careers are won/lost/quit; it is like life on steroids because the decisions we make at this stage of life seem to carry more weight than ever before, laying the groundwork for our adult lives.

Zach and I adopted Stanley the Greyhound, it was strange to think that the decision would have a huge effect on my life for about the next ten years. I think it is important to take big decisions seriously, but it is just as important to be be able to break them down into manageable terms. We cannot always know exactly where the decisions we make will take us or what the consequences might turn out to be. It helps me to think of big choices in terms of "day by day". Each day, I will choose to take on the consequences (good or bad) of the decisions that have led me to that point (big or small). I guess a huge decision is simply made up of a bunch of small ones.

With all the decision-making and changes taking place, the constants become increasingly important. I am really grateful for the consistency of something like monthly brunch club but more so for the relationships that led to it in the first place.

Maybe you are not in this very scarily exciting time of your life, and you could use some change! If that is the case (and even if not because who really cares if their food changes as long as it is delicious), you may consider trying the following recipe from the hugely popular baking blog, Bakerella. Here, she comes up with the most creative little treasures, pancakes in the form of mini-muffins...Puffins. Brilliant! They are dip-able/dunk-able (however you prefer to put it) little pancakes: dip in syrup and eat with your hands. You can make them in any variety of pancake; I went with blueberry puffins and chocolate chip puffins.



Chocolate Chip Puffins

(Recipe from Bakerella, makes 24)

1 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
2/3 cup buttermilk
1 egg
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
2 tablespoons melted butter
1/2 cup milk chocolate chips (I did half blueberry/half chocolate chip so I used 1/4 C chocolate chips and 1/4 C fresh blueberries)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and sugar in a medium bowl. Sift together with a wire whisk.
In another bowl, stir buttermilk, egg, maple syrup and melted butter until just combined.
Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and stir with a spoon until combined.
Stir in chocolate chips. Reserve a few chips to sprinkle on the tops.
Bake for 8-9 minutes.

Makes 24 mini pancake muffins.

Let cool slightly and remove from the pan. You may need to use a toothpick around the edges to separate the pancake muffins from the pan.

Serve immediately with warmed butter if you like or even just with maple syrup.

COMING SOON: I made another dish for brunch that was potentially my favorite dish I have ever contributed to the feast. For a sneak peak, check out the yellow thing with bits of green in it on the bottom of my plate (I apologize for the horrible picture)...