Remember our gingerbread house that we made last weekend? This is what it looks like now!!
It started with Kevin cutting out a window on Monday to munch on. I tried a bit and it was soo gooood, so I decided to cut out the door to eat the next day. Then Kevin started to pick out some of the candies and jelly hearts. Before we knew it, the round stained glass was cut out too, follow by the other window. At last we tore down the whole back wall to eat! Hehehehe. So...goodbye beautiful gingerbread house but hello gingerbread manger! Don't you think it somewhat look like a manger now? :D
It started to rain early yesterday and changed to very light snow sometime in the evening. It was full on snow by late evening. This picture was taken around 10pm at night. It was snowing so hard that couldn't even see the houses outside our window. All we could see was tiny lights. It was really beautiful though.
The snow didn't really stick because the ground was still relatively hot. I took those two photos around 8:30am in the morning and you can see that the snow was already melting away. It was totally gone by noon. Stick or no stick, looks like we got our first snow for the season.
I have always wanted to try and make a gingerbread house and Kevin said he has never done it before. So, we decided to get it and try to make our first gingerbread house. I know, this is kinda like cheating because it comes with 
This is the contents of the gingerbread house kit. 
The first thing you need to do is knead the icing bag for at least 60 seconds. It is to soften the icing and also to make sure that the icing is mixed up evenly and has a smooth consistency. Once that is done, cut the bag at the corner. Make sure it is not too large or it might get messy.
Pipe icing along the edges on the back of the gingerbread walls.
Construct the base of the house and hold on to it until the icing sets. This should take a few minutes.
Next, pipe the icing along the roof edges.
Once that is done, attach the roof to the base of the house. Allow the icing to set for at least 15 minutes before you begin decorating the house.
We started off decorating the house by piping icing along the doors, windows and 'stain glass' of the house.
We then added candy on the doors, windows, 'stain glass' as well as made candy hollies on the front and side of the house.
Next, we piped icing along the edges of the house, to give it a snow effect.
Then we applied icing on the roof, to make it look like snow. More candy is placed on the roof. We also made a candy walkway and a candy fence around the house. After almost an hour of decorating (and really sticky fingers from the icing and candy), we were done at last! 
Here is the front and side view of our gingerbread house!! What do you think? :D We sure had loads of fun making this and we still have lots of unused leftover candy from this little project. 
Well, at last the cards are all done, labels printed and we just need to mail it out tomorrow. I hope they arrive on time, if not..hey, it's the thought that counts!
On a different note, I just saw this music video on TV a while ago. I love it so much! Two of my favorite artist doing a Christmas duet. They digitally added Martina McBride to The Kings '68 Comeback Special' and it's one of the best rendition of Blue Christmas I have ever heard. Check it out! 
Penang has always been our favorite Malaysian restaurant ever. There are a few branches in the NY/NJ region but our favorite is the branch in Edision. It's closest to us and it's a little bit cheaper compared to the one in Lodi (also pretty close to us). The Malaysian food served in Penang is as authentic as you can get here in the States. Trust me, I was born and grew up in Penang (yes, the island in Malaysia, not the restaurant). I know the difference between authentic Penang food and rip offs.
My mother in law was in town a couple of weeks back and we decided to take her to try some Malaysian food. Penang is always crowded on weekends, so you have to be patient and wait a while for a table. We were pretty lucky that night cos we didn't really have to wait THAT long for a table. 
The servers were bubbly and helpful, as always. They took our drink orders and gave us a few minutes to look through the menu. My MIL had a fresh coconut ($3.50) and Kevin had a Coke ($1.75). Chinese tea and ice water is on the house. 
We started off with some Roti Canai ($3.95) and Satay ($7.50). The roti canai was very close to the ones we have at the mamaks back home. It's really good. I felt that the Satay wasn't really worth the money. $7.50 for 5 sticks of satay? It's almost sinful to spend so much on 5 sticks of satay. The taste was so so, it taste almost the same as the ones we make at home (with the instant satay marinade). 
We also ordered some Penang LorBak ($9.95). The lorbak wasn't really that good. It tasted weird, not like the lorbak I know. However, the home made deep fried tofu and prawn fritters was really good. I am a little disappointed with the dipping sauce though. It came with chili sauce and some tee cheow (sweet sauce). How can they serve lorbak without the 'lor'? Oh well :( 
Of course we had the Char Koay Teow ($7.95). Kevin loves the Char Koay Teow in Penang. I kinda like it too, it's better than the one in Nyonya or other Malaysian restaurants in the city. 
My MIL had Wonton Mee ($7.50). It was alright, generous amounts of wonton but it wasn't really the Malaysian type of wontons. The wonton noodles were springy and good though. I liked the soup base, it was really flavorful. 
I ordered the Penang Fish Head Beehoon ($7.50). That's my all time favorite dish in that restaurant! I would usually substitute the beehoon with yellow noodles. It's really really good, with lots of deep fried fish head pieces and salted vegetables.
One of the desserts that you MUST order when you are in Penang is the Peanut Pancake ($7.95). It's actually roti canai stuffed with ground peanuts, butter and sugar (something like the filling for Ban Chang Koay). It might seem a little bit expensive for dessert, but it's worth it. The mamaks in Malaysia should start making this, it's soooo gooooood.
We also had Pulut Hitam ($3.50) and Bo Bo ChaCha ($3.50). They both tasted great, almost as good as how my grandma used to make them while I was growing up. I would always order the Pulut Hitam when ever I need a little dose of home :P
Well, you would need the 'pig' as well as the 'blanket'. Total no brainer huh? You would need a pack of franks/hot dogs (I used beef franks but you can pretty much use anything you want) and a tube of ready made crescent dough. You can use the original or garlic butter, it doesn't really matter. 
Pop open the tube of dough and unroll it out on a cutting board.
Separate the dough into the precut triangles and place a beef frank in the middle of it.
Spray a baking sheet with some non stick cooking spray and place the rolled up dough and franks on the sheet. Put it in the oven and bake for 12 minutes at 350F.
We spent a good part of the weekend putting up our Christmas tree. We started by laying out the branches as per instructions and slowly assembling the tree from bottom upwards.
At last, the tree is up. Wooohoo! 
Now it's time to untangle the lights and test to see if its working properly. All is well, so up on the tree it goes. We have about 600 lights, so that works out great. I read somewhere that the correct amount of lights per tree is 100 lights per foot of the tree. We have a 6ft tree, so that works!
Once the lights are up, its time to put up the garlands. We are using dark red beads this year.
Next, the ornaments and red bows goes on the tree. 
The tree is almost done. Now, we only need to hang up the candy canes, put on the tree skirt and top it off with a star
There you go! What do you think of our tree?
Oh wait, we forgot something. We forgot to set up our limited edition Pittsburgh Steelers collectible electric train set. Yes, we bleed black and gold. Only real Steeler fans will have this running around their Christmas tree!! 
