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12/31/11 - Cookie Tree - Much Belated

We had a really hectic December, what with Christmas, a trip to San Francisco, Christmas and even more Christmas. We couldn't have done it without a little help from our friends, particularly in the decorating of our cookie tree. This year as always, we bake the gingerbread cookies, set up the tree and break open a few bottles of champagne, and our friends, like Santa's elves, magically decorate our cookie tree.

We know this is awfully late, but here are a few pictures of some of the great cookies. Yes, we did manage to hang those hard to dry cookies. That glitter icing gel looks great, but stays runny for hours, not that we let that stop us.

The cookie factory

Some cookies, in situ

Some cookies, in situ

Some cookies, in situ

Some cookies, in situ

Cookies and candles

The tree in action

Keywords: christmas

12/24/11 - San Francisco, Monterey and Big Sur

We've just returned from an adventure in San Francisco, Monterey and Big Sur. We got to see the city at its Christmas best and explore the natural wonders of the Pacific coast where the mountains go down to the sea. We also spent some time at the Monterey Bay Aquarium which is almost our home away from home, except that the feeding time food is for the birds.

For more on our trip:

San Francisco

Monterey and Big Sur

The Filbert Street steps

A San Francisco view

The Golden Gate Bridge

One of the new trails along the Pacific

Union Square at Christmas

Andrew Molera State Park

Another view from Andrew Molera

A ctenaphore at the Monterey Bay Aquarium

A sea dragon - we can watch these all day

Garrapatta State Park - Look for the Invasive Plants sign

Point Lobos State Reserve

Keywords: christmas, san francisco, trails

12/11/11 - Christmas 2011 - Some Production Stills

The big Hollywood studios do this all the time. They always have a few photographers wandering the set to provide pictures for publicity purposes or for the DVD or BluRay extras. So, here are a few Kaleberg Studios production stills showing you what happens behind the scenes in the making of Christmas 2011.

Early on, the gaffers have set up the basic table wiring. This structures the entire spread.

We lay out of few set pieces - half and half cookies and the fruitcake - while horticultural takes a whack at those shrubs out front for wire hiding foliage.

As production moves along, we block out the table into the major Christmas food groups: desserts, savories and egg nog

Here's a shot of a lighting test with Godzilla in full welcoming glow

Another lighting test of the big tree and mantle drape

This looks simple, but it's actually a working model of a Jovian moon with an icy core, an outer snowy layer, space defense towers and a number of indigenous life forms.

Here's a final cosmetic check on the cassoulet.

Keywords: christmas

12/10/11 - Cassoulet in Progress

Cassoulet is not one of those dishes you can just throw together from stuff you have lying around the house. It takes a bit of planning and preparation. We made our duck confit last month, and it's been ripening in its jar. We ordered our pig skin and sausages from The Swinery a while back and had everything shipped for our party week.

Then, our cassoulet took over our kitchen. We brought out our stained, wrinkled cookbook and double checked the post it note warning us "Do not TRIPLE this recipe." Some years back we had tripled the recipe and had so much cassoulet we couldn't store it in the refrigerator and had to put an overflow pot of it out in the car. Luckily it was a cold New England night.

As you can see in the photos, making a cassoulet is quite a process, but then again, cassoulet is quite a dish.

The pig skin underbelly

The ragout in progress

Every pot in the house

Andouille in the mesoderm

Cassoulet!

Keywords: christmas, food

12/07/11 - Half and Half Cookies

Half and half cookies are probably a New York City thing. They definitely don't show up at bakeries on the west coast. They bring back a lot of childhood memories of dealing with deep philosophical problems, like whether to eat the dark side or the light side first, or whether it make more sense to alternate. Now, they're a Christmas thing.

We offer our recipe, based on the Gourmet, December 2005 one. We've made a minor change to the icing. It actually tastes a lot better if you use bar sugar (extra finely ground sugar) rather than confectioner's powdered sugar. The later contains a fair bit of corn starch, and it throws the flavor off. We've also been putting a fair bit of orange peel in with the white icing which gives it a rich orange flavor which really constrasts with the chocolate. (We're not purists.)

Half and half cookies

Keywords: christmas, recipe

12/06/11 - A Sure Sign of Christmas

There's one sure sign of Christmas in Port Angeles, the annual Christmas firetruck. We wait for it every year.

Here comes Christmas.

It's brilliant and sparkly and glowing (and a bit blurry).

There goes a great metaphor.

Keywords: christmas, port angeles

12/04/11 - Christmas - Work in Progress

Christmas is underway Chez Kaleberg. Since we like to get the biggest tree we can, we hit the tree stands early. This means that the Christmas transformation is already underway. Here are some construction shots to give you an idea of this year's undertaking.

We've already made the cookies. We'll be decorating the gingerbread cookies for the small tree later today, but we already have a big pile of almond spritz cookies, and we've started putting them on the tree. These are strictly decorative. You can eat them, and they aren't awful, but they are a bit bland and not to everyone's taste. (How's that for being diplomatic?)

We also have the starwich cookies. We used to put these on the cookie tree, but then we'd snatch them off and eat them. They are now strictly for eating. They're basically almond shortbread cookies with raspberry jam and, if anything, they taste better than they look.

We'll post more pictures as the house gets decorated.

The big tree and boxes of ornaments

Starwich cookies - not long for this world

Almond spritz cookies - purely decorative

Some tree top detail with Pierrot presiding

The cookie tree in the early stages

Keywords: christmas

11/07/11 - Frost On Hurricane Hill

This was a hard post to compose. There were so many amazing photographs of the gray skies, majestic mountains and frost covered trees and grasses that we just gave up and chose eleven pictures when we could have chosen dozens. Judging from the webcams and weather reports, the ice seems to have melted on Hurricane Hill, so we are glad we managed to capture our amazing walk in the sky.

The summit

A view down

Frost on the grass

Mountain sky and frosty trees

A field of ice

More mountain sky

Windblown

Grasses and sky

Another view down

Did we mention the sky?

It's almost Christmas.

Keywords: christmas, hurricane hill, weather, winter

10/07/11 - Signs of Christmas

While we were hiking on Hurricane Hill, we couldn't help but notice signs of the season. Yes, there was some autumn color, but when we Kalebergs say "season", we mean "Christmas season". So while the stores are still pushing Halloween candy, stage makeup and costumes, we Kalebergs are already leaping ahead to the real thing. We usually don't jump the gun like this, but there were the signs: the first snow and the brilliant red and green of the season.

Snow by the trail

Snow on the trees

Look, Christmas trees

and more Christmas trees

We've really got to start decorating.

There's the red and green.

Deck the trails.

OK, so this is a bit autumnal.

That might make a nice tree blanket.

Keywords: autumn, christmas, hurricane hill, trails

12/27/10 - Because You Can't Have Enough Closeups of Our Cookie Tree

Here are some more of the great cookies, and a little chair made from a champagne cage, that the elves our friends made for our cookie tree.





Keywords: christmas

12/21/10 - Christmas Party

We held our big people's Christmas party, and the place was magical. Of course, it didn't look so magical with the flash, so we took shakey time exposure shots without a tripod. Magical means blurry in this context. Still, the party was kind of magical.

Our Godzilla Christmas angel was aglow with atomic fire. Our cookie tree aglow with candles, and our guests aglow with choucroute garnie, bourbon sodden fruitcake, brie en croute with cranberry chutney and, of course, our thermonuclear egg nog. It's the same recipe we use for Godzilla's atomic fire.

Yet another magical, i.e. blurry, Kaleberg Christmas.

A blurry shot of the cookie tree

A blurry shot of our party spread

Our Christmas tree lies in wait.

Keywords: christmas, recipe

12/14/10 - The Kaleberg Cookie Tree

Every year we draft our friends and their children to help decorate our cookie tree. We always have two Christmas trees. One is nine feet tall and covered with ornaments. The other is much smaller and covered with cookies and lit by candles.

As usual, there are some pretty good looking cookies hanging from our cookie tree, thanks to the magic of 10X confectioner's powdered sugar, food coloring and the hard work of good friends.









Keywords: christmas

12/11/10 - Santa Is Coming To Town

Every year the Port Angeles fire department sends out Santa to spread Christmas cheer and collect money for local charities. As one might expect, Santa rides a firetruck, so we literally await his siren call in early December. This year, it was raining, but Santa doesn't get stopped by snow, so the rain barely slowed him down.

Santa is coming ...

Santa, and his helpers, are here!

Good bye, Santa, see you on the 25th.

Keywords: christmas, port angeles

12/09/10 - Christmas in Seattle

We made another lightning trip into Seattle, and since it is December, we checked out the gingerbread house show in the Sheraton Towers lobby. This year, the theme was houses, so they had cozy houses, tree houses, farm houses and space houses, all done with gingerbread, candies, icing and other wonders.

Remembering the good old days, before the housing bust ...








Keywords: seattle, christmas

12/06/10 - Around Port Angeles

We were exploring downtown Port Angeles and dropped into the new Blow Hard Glass Gallery which is down on Railroad Avenue. Railroad Avenue always seemed like the industrial poor sister to Front and First Streets, which was a pity as it is the first street one sees getting off a ferry from Victoria. The new bus terminal and related work seem to have improved things a bit, and the new glass gallery is a great new addition. (Yes, we know, they opened in May, but readers of this site know that we are always months and often years behind the times.)

We also dropped into the Princess Valiant Coffee shop, and picked up some of their fresh roasted coffee. We were pleased to see that they also sell Dry Creek Farm eggs among other things.

We then dropped into Port Book and News, but we've entered the Christmas book embargo. Basically, no one is allowed to buy him or herself any books lest this interfere with the other's gift book buying. There is a reason we call this the most skulkiest time of the year. We really liked the little motorized amusement park in the front window. It's a great holiday season touch.

Click the image for video

Prince Valiant, more than coffee

Lots more than coffee

Blow Hard Glass Studio

More glass

Keywords: christmas, dry creek farm, port angeles

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