Sandra Lee's Holiday Special 2008

First off, if you are ever in need of a dose of Semi-Homemade snark, then please head over to TWoP and read the Semi-Ho board.

Thoughts on this special:
I watched this twice now and also read all the comments about this special at TWoP to help remind me of everything she did. I've never understood why on her specials it appears that her poor guests have to wait around while she makes everything. What would make sense would be to show us the prep, tell us what order to make the food in, when we need to start cooking so the guests have something to eat when they arrive, and then show us some shots of the guests mingling and eating the food.

The cocktails: Um, she's a lush and should just start mainlining the stuff and be done with it. If you doubt me then watch this video featuring her cocktail tree from a show she did in '06. Thanks to Rosie Hawthorne for the video!




Cranberry Glazed Turkey I love turkey and cranberries but that poor turkey looked so pale before she put the glaze on! I have to cover up my turkey for part of the cooking time or else it gets way too brown. Ugh.

I can't believe I'm saying this but the Sausage Stuffed Mushrooms would probably be pretty good. I think it would be better with homemade cornbread but, compared to some of her other creations this is a big improvement!! You do need to serve this with plates and forks as
this is not a good choice for finger food.

Potato Leek Fondue Soup Well we've got canned potatoes and canned potato soup so it looks like Sandy is back! Since she's now shilling for Ore-Ida, wouldn't this have been a good opportunity to use their product and this recipe?

Sweet Potato Souffles Um, these are not souffles. They are sweet potatoes with marshmallow fluff on them just call it that and be done with it.

Cappuccino "Cup" Cakes Okay, I'm not a fan of Cool Whip or cake mix but, this would be good with some tweaking. Make up your own favorite yellow cake batter and leave off the Cool Whip and use fresh whipped cream or even Reddi-Whip. Why there is an emphasis on making pretty swirls in the batter when the top will be covered up with the Cool Whip or whipped cream?


Brown Butter Almond Brussels Sprouts I hate Brussels sprouts! Wasting butter and almonds on this recipe saddens me and using almond extract on Brussels Sprouts has me mystified.

Holiday Wreath Cupcakes
*Whimpers* Make it stop! So chocolate cupcakes and muffins are interchangeable? Canned icing? Crumpled aluminum foil? Fruit rollups?? How do you eat the darn thing without getting it all over yourself??

There's no room for the food after she got through with her tablescapin'. *confused*

It's arts and crafts time !!

A few years ago I made myself a small microwavable rice filled pad to heat up for my feet, back, etc. The design was very simple, just a rectangle made from a queen size pillow case folded up a few times, filled up halfway with uncooked rice and sewn shut. The rice could flow freely within the pillow so if I wanted it flat, I had to put it down and smooth it out with my hands. Since at that time I wanted it to be versatile, this was fine. Now I have decided I need a different design more suited to keeping both the top and bottom of my feet warm in the winter while I'm at my computer desk.

I'm not very good at explaining my design so go grab a hand towel, lay it on the floor, put your feet on it about an inch from one of the short ends, and then fold up the end farthest away from you so it covers up the top of your feet. Got that? Now imagine that the towel is sectioned off into several sections and has rice inside with more rice on the part that is underneath your feet. The width is such that the sides will overlap when the pad is folded over the top of your feet but the sides will not be sewn together to create a pocket.

Be sure to insert your pad into a clean pillowcase to keep it clean as you would need to remove all the rice before you could wash it if something got on the rice pad. Anyway, just thought I'd share if anybody is trying to save on their heating bills and still keep their feet warm this winter.