It's a Semi-Homemade Halloween!

It's that time of year again - time for Sandra Lee to do a semi-homemade Halloween like only she can. FN was nice enough to put together a special video about her past and present costume craziness.




Sandra also gave an interview to PopEater about this year's Halloween show.

"It is hilarious. It's good TV. You'll never know you're watching Food Network," Lee tells PopEater of her Halloween episode.

You're close, Sandra. The reaction is usually more like "I can't believe this is on the Food Network!"

We know that you love to make cocktails on 'Semi-Homemade,' so what's on your drink menu for Halloween?

My Crystal Ball martini and my Queen of the Fairies cocktail. They're great. But I have to say for moms that are going out with their kids trick or treating, I highly recommend you have one espresso martini.

Oh Sandra.

Sticking with good habits

Guest post written by Caroline Waters

I don't know why, but it seems like good habits are always the hardest ones to keep. But it's those really bad for you habits, like eating ice cream out of hte carton every night after dinner, that are so easy to keep that it's like clockwork.

I started running a couple of months ago during the summer but now that it's getting colder outside, it's harder for me to get myself out of bed in the morning and make myself run before I take a shower and head off to work. I was on Facebook with my DIRECTV internet bundle the other night complaining to one of my best friends about how hard this habit is to keep when she told me that she likes running in the morning even mroe during the winter because after it she doesn't even need a cup of coffee.

She's a caffeine addict so I had trouble believing that until I actually went running on my first cold morning. It really did wake me up like nothing else and I think that I may like it better too. I just hope that that will help me stick to my runner routine even more.

Food Network Magazine: October

I picked up the October issues of Food Network magazine awhile ago.  It's actually the first time that I've bought it - I'm more of a Bon Appetit, Food & Wine type of person, but I'd heard good things about it from a few friends so I decided to check it out.  It's actually not bad; there are some cute ideas and some recipes that I would try.  (There's a caramel apple cake in there that looks awesome.) I'll probably buy it again.

There was one thing that made me laugh.  One of the pages in the Table of Contents is called Star Search, and it lists all of the Food Network "stars" and which pages you can find them on in the magazine.  I noticed that Sandra Lee was only listed for one page, so of course I skipped ahead to that one to see what fabulous semi-homemade delights awaited me.

I was bitterly disappointed to discover that the page was a piece about a Food Network stars' pumpkin-carving contest.  The magazine gave out "awards" to each pumpkin, like Most Nostalgic for Aida Mollenkamp's Pac-Man ghost carving, and Best Use of Power Tools for Ted Allen's blowtorched creation.  So what was Sandra's award?  Best Update on a Classic for her pretty basic design, which made me laugh cause it seems to me like it was a case of "Best Totally Generic Looking Pumpkin That We Have To Give An Award To".

It was really funny to me that they didn't let Sandra do anything in this issue except carve a pumpkin, especially since she goes so over-the-top about Halloween on her show and surely thinks she's the Halloween Queen of the Food Network.  Like I said, I've never bought the magazine before, so I'm sure that other issues have included some of her recipes, but I thought it was pretty telling that she was almost completely left out of the October issue.

Wordless Wednesday: Halloween

Basketball Season!

If you've been reading this blog, you might have the impression that I watch nothing but the Food Network and other cooking and home shows, but that's actually not the case.  One of the other things that I love to watch is sports.  So I'm excited that basketball season is starting, especially since baseball season is coming to an end.

I've been a basketball fan since I was a kid, and the Knicks are my team, so it's been a challenging few years.  It got to the point where I actually started to feel bad for those scalpers who hang around outside Madison Square Garden offering up New York Knicks tickets.  For the past few years I've felt like my money was better spent on concerts tickets or some other sport, but this season I'm feeling like maybe it's time to get out there and support my team again.

Maybe it's the whole LeBron James thing.  I'm sure that Miami Heat tickets are selling fast thanks to LeBron and company, but something about that whole thing just feels off to me.  Of course as a Knicks fan I'm already biased against the Heat, but I feel like in the end it's going to end up being a good thing that LeBron didn't end up on the Knicks.  I guess we'll just have to wait and see.  And I wonder how sales of Denver Nuggets tickets are doing with all of the Carmelo Anthony trade rumors swirling around.  If the Knicks do end up getting him it could definitely be an interesting year.

And while I'm at it with the whole rooting for the underdogs thing, maybe I'll even pop for some New Jersey Nets tickets.  Even though I've been a Knicks fan for years I've always had a soft spot for the Nets, and they could definitely use a little support after the, um, disappointing year they had last year. And if things don't work out...well, there's always football.

Wordless Wednesday: Cozy Coffee

5 Hour Energy for Busy Moms?

I've been seeing this commercial for 5 Hour Energy a lot lately.




So this mom needs 5 Hour Energy to get her through the day because she works so hard, both at her day job and her second job of taking care of the kids and the house.  She tells us this as she struggles in the door in her work clothes with two big grocery bags while the kids run around her, and then she tells us that 5 Hour Energy was suggested to her by her husband, who they show sitting around on the sofa reading a magazine.

I can't be the only one who saw this commercial and thought, "Hmm.  Maybe if her husband would put the magazine down, get off his butt and help her out a little, she wouldn't need an energy drink in the first place!"  Maybe I'm overanalyzing, but it seems a bit tone deaf to make a commercial targeted to busy working moms and include a not-at-all-busy-just-chilling-on-the-couch-with-a-magazine dad in there as the person who recommended the product in the first place.  "Hey, this stuff will give my wife more energy to do everything so that I don't have to get up and help!"

Of course, the main reason I've never tried 5 Hour Energy is not their advertising, but the fact that I've heard that the product tastes like cough syrup.  But ads like these don't really put me in a hurry to find out for myself.    

Wordless Wednesday: Autumn Leaves

Early Holiday Shopping (For Once)

When it comes to holiday shopping, I have always been a big procrastinator. I'm always the one paying an arm and a leg for express shipping to get stuff on time, and I consider it a triumph if I'm not at the mall on Christmas Eve. (December 23rd is totally acceptable though.) I'll admit that part of me enjoys the last minute chaos, but every year I have a hurried and frustrated moment when I promise myself that next year I'll start my shopping earlier.

Okay, so usually I don't keep that promise to myself, but this year I'm giving it a try. My dad is really hard to shop for, so I'm starting with him. I'm thinking of getting him a new watch this year. Watches aren't the most unique gift ever, so I've been looking online to see if I can find some options that are distinctive. (And of course a good value would be nice too.) I've been using Become.com because it's great for comparison shopping. I think my front-runner right now is this Nixon The Quatro watch:

Of course I got distracted in the middle of my watch shopping and started looking at jewelry. After a few minutes I forced myself to at least stop looking at stuff for myself and get back to the early holiday shopping mission.  My mom has tons of jewelry, so anytime that I decide to buy her some I know that I have to find something different and unique for her.

I'm not normally into floral jewelry but there's something that I like about these flower hoop earrings:

I also like these gold leaf teardrops. I think black and gold is a really sophisticated combination:

I'm also looking at charms - my best friend's daughter has a charm bracelet and she loves getting new charms.    Since jewelry with keys on it is so trendy now, I'm thinking this cute little charm might work:

See? I'm totally making progress. I'm sure that I'll still be at the mall on December 23rd, but by doing some of my research and shopping ahead of time, at least it'll be a less stressful and more festive experience.

Auto Repair Tech Support

Most of my family knows that I'm a huge Internet addict who is online all the time.  As a result, I'm usually the go to person for questions about online shopping, social media, the ever popular "hey, is this email forward true?" questions, the most useful websites, and things like that.  That's how I recently found myself researching the best San Diego auto repair shops despite the fact that I live all the way across the country.

See, my cousin lives in San Diego, and she asked me to help her find a place when her Ford F-150 started acting up.  It still cracks me up to think of her driving a big truck truck like that, cause I'm not a big car person at all.  Her husband was the one who picked it out - but no jokes about women drivers here, she handles it just as well as he does.  That's actually part of the reason why she was looking for a new auto shop - at the place she was using before, let's just say that some of the men who worked there were having a hard time grasping the concept that a woman might actually be a really good driver and know a little something about cars.

So, even though I'm personally not that knowledgeable about car issues (I know enough to know when something's wrong and not to ignore the check engine light and stuff like that, but I'm not an expert), I was able to get online and help her out by finding a site with a directory of auto shops along with customer reviews and a lot of basic car info to help the car challenged among us understand more about what's going on before we make the trip to one of those auto shops.  Just call me auto repair tech support.

I'm A Coffee-Addicted Dork

I got my Starbucks Rewards gold card in the mail the other day and I'm way too excited about it.  What can I say?  I'm addicted.  And if I need my caffeine fix anyway, I figure I might as well be getting discounts and earning points towards some free drinks at the same time, right?

I'm also happy that pumpkin spice lattes are back; I have to go and get my first one of the season soon.  (Now I'm just looking forward to the day when Thanksgiving Blend makes its first appearance because that's a favorite of mine.) I'm also tempted to try the new toffee mocha, but I'm not totally sure.  I love toffee, but I feel like this is the type of drink that will either be amazingly perfect and awesome or buttery and cloying and weird and gross.  Has anyone out there tried it? Leave a comment and let me know what you thought!  I need to take my new gold card for a spin.

Wordless Wednesday: Pumpkin

Who else hates the new Burger King breakfast ads?

If unfunny and grating is what Burger King was going for with these commercials, I think they succeeded:



I don't think I'll be downloading the BK Breakfast March for my ipod any time soon. I never thought I'd miss the ads with the creepy king. And of course the only woman who is prominently featured in the ad is the stereotypical hot chick who causes the guys to fall all over themselves. Sexism: it's what's for breakfast.