Gingerbread Cupcakes

These pretty cupcakes are such festive treats for Christmas. How would you like them as handmade Christmas gifts? Click here to find recipes.

Apple Cider Punch

I made this last night at a Thanksgiving dinner party that I attended. It was a potluck and every guest had to contribute to the Thanksgiving menu. I offered to prepare this beverage because it was easy and I didn't have to do any cooking at home and worry about carrying it and driving it to the party.. I just brought a couple bottles of sparkling wine and used the orange juice, apple cider and lemon juice that were already in the host's fridge and I made the punch at the party right after everybody had arrived. It was such an easy and exotic cocktail recipe that I had pulled off very successful even it was my first trial. It's a fool-proof beverage to make for a big crowd in a couple minutes. It was a big hit and there was no one drop of the punch left in the punch bowl after dinner. I doubled up the recipe and I used organe juice. Next time, I would like to try making it with the cranberry-juice that the recipe also suggested. Click here to see the recipe.

Homemade Bratwurst Bites with Beer and Horseradish Mustard

This Bratwurst recipe is featured on the Bon Appetit Magazine Oct 2009 issue, how do you like it?

Mocha Nut Torte Recipe

This torte recipe is featured on the Taste of Home Magazine Dec 2007 issue, how do you like it?

Brisket Braised in Porter

This brisket recipe is featured on the Bon Appetit Magazine Oct 2009 issue, how do you like it?

Caramel-Crunch Pumpkin Pie Recipe

This pumpkin pie recipe is featured on the Taste of Home Magazine Dec 2007 issue, how do you like it?

Citrus-Avocado Salad

This recipe is featured in the book "Test Kitchen Favorites: 75 Years of Recipes Too Good To Be Forgotten" . You can also find the recipe here.

This recipe was first published by Better Homes & Garden in 1939. One of the ingredients in this recipe is pomegranate seeds. We don't know how widely available were avocados and pomegranate seeds back in 1939 in America since none of us are native of this country, but even with such ingredients easily found in our grocery stores today, we still find this salad refreshing and exotic in today's food-rich culture. The combination of avocado and pomegranate seeds in a salad? We haven't had such an exotic salad even in restaurants in Santa Monica or anywhwere in our metropoltian hometowns in Asia....and we live and breathe in the restaurants all over the world... We've got to try to make this one at home for sure. We love this book cause it shows us a lot of America's history. Amazing what one can learn from a cookbook, no wonder we can't stop buying them... We can only imagine how innovative and forward thinking the American cooks were in 1939. That was before even Julia Child's stint in France. We can't help but wonder why couldn't she look back at her home turf for cooking inspiration. From what I heard from her, it was France that introduced the world of good food to her. May be she would have started cooking earlier if only she had subsribed to the Better Homes & Garden magazines. And just how many Americans in 1939 were oblivious to this forward-thinking recipe, like Julia Child was?