NY Foodie Family

Five on Friday {Happy 2020}

Posted on December 27, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

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Happy Friday! I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah! It’s been a busy couple of days celebrating the holidays. While my husband and I have been working this week, the kids have been enjoying sleeping in and relaxing! It’s hard to believe that the next Five on Friday will be in 2020! We are planning a low-key New Year’s Eve celebration with family game night and appetizers and snacks for dinner! Honestly, I may not even stay awake to watch the ball drop. I hope everyone has a happy and safe New Year’s Eve! Here are five from this week:

1. Christmas Eve – our tradition is to spend Christmas Eve at my cousin’s house in Connecticut. We only usually see this side of the family once a year, so it’s a fun time catching up. We brought a dessert pizza and a variety of Christmas cookies from the different cookie exchanges. There was also apple crisp, lots of other cookies and a panettone. But my brother brought this flourless chocolate cake that was not only beautiful but delicious!

2. Christmas – We always host Christmas with both my parents and Dana’s parents. Plus, my brother came up from Pennsylvania and Dana’s aunt came over. We made turkey, rice and gandules, mashed sweet potatoes and roasted root vegetables with a balsamic sauce. It was another delicious meal and we all ended the evening stuffed!

3. Holiday Gifts – Two of my gifts this year were this mug and a Fitbit Inspire HR. Some of our other gifts included a new air fryer and sheets for our bed.

4. Reading – I have been reading holiday themed books this month. I just finished Let It Snow by Nancy Thayer, which was a cute Christmas read. My last holiday book for the year is 25 days ‘Til Christmas by Poppy Alexander. I hope to have this finished before the new year.

5. Watching – This past week we watched a couple of movies. My daughter and I watched Where’d You Go Bernadette? I read the book ages ago and remember not liking it. However, the movie wasn’t bad. It rarely happens where I enjoy the movie more than the book! Dana, our daughter and I also watched The Art of Racing in the Rain since the three of us had all read the book. It followed the book pretty closely and we all liked it.

Sharing with Five on Friday! Have a great weekend. Happy New Year! I’ll be back in 2020!!

Five on Friday {Have a Holly Jolly Christmas….}

Posted on December 20, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

Happy Friday everyone! This is the home stretch to the holidays!
Hanukkah begins on Sunday this year. The kids requested that we celebrate with potato latkes and jelly doughnuts. We will also be busy finishing up our holiday shopping and wrapping all the presents this weekend.

This will be the last post on the blog before the holidays. So before I get into my five from this week, I want to wish everyone a Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas and Happy Kwanzaa. Whatever holiday you celebrate, may you enjoy the time with your family and friends. We will be celebrating Christmas Eve at my aunt’s house. Then Christmas Day we will be hosting my parents and brother and my in-laws and my husband’s aunt.

Here are five from this week:

1. Supper Club – This month’s supper club was our annual pizza night and cookie exchange. Above is a picture of the different pizzas we had. My husband made a Chocolate Chip Dessert Pizza and I made a Mushroom Arugula Pizza. Plus, the daughter of one of the couples in the group decided to make pretzels. It was a delicious evening, but needless to say, we were stuffed!

2. Cookie Exchanges – At our December supper club we also do a cookie exchange. This year, I made Cranberry Bliss cookies, based off the Starbucks Cranberry Bliss Bars, which I’ve never had. Dana made Maple Brown Sugar cookies. Luckily, my cookie recipe made four dozen cookies, because I brought some in for my office cookie exchange, which was this week as well. This is always a delicious time of year!

3. Reading – This week I finished another Christmas read, Christmas at Little Street Bakery. This was an okay holiday read. I’m hoping to get a couple more holiday themed books in before the end of the year.

4. Band Concerts – This was also the week of band concerts. Of course, the kids’ concerts were on separate evenings. So we had two nights that we had to go. We always love hearing my daughter play with the smaller jazz band (pictured above) before the regular concert. They are really good!

5. Another Day Off – Tuesday, we got hit with an ice storm and enjoyed another day off school/work. It’s days like these, when the roads are hazardous, that I’m especially grateful that my husband can work from home.

ICYMI this week on the blog:

Wednesday, I wrote about Westchester Winter Wonderland.

Sharing with Friday Favorites. Have a great weekend and a happy holiday!

Westchester Winter Wonderland

Posted on December 18, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

Hey locals! Have you been to Westchester Winter Wonderland yet? This Westchester County attraction is a holiday family must-do. Located at the Kensico Dam Plaza in Valhalla, this is Westchester Winter Wonderland’s 6th season of holiday family fun.

Bundle up and get ready to enjoy all that Winter Wonderland has to offer. When you first arrive, you will be amazed by all of the lights! The attraction is festive and brightly lit with all kinds of colorful lights.

The $20 admission price is all-inclusive. Entertainment, rides, ice skating and a visit with Santa are all included. This year, there are ten rides including a Fun Slide, Ferris wheel, Cyclone and more. Most of the rides are geared towards the younger kids. However, our family enjoyed a ride down the Fun Slide and on the Ferris wheel.

Make sure to enjoy some skating on the ice rink. As I mentioned, skate rentals and ice skating is included in the ticket price. Dana and my son enjoyed some time on the ice. Before skating, you are given a pink wrist band, which is basically a waiver acknowledging and accepting the dangers of the activity.

Do not miss the Winter Wonderland Circus performance during your visit. Even Dana and I were impressed with the juggling, acrobatics and other circus acts crammed into the tent.

If you are hungry, there is plenty to eat, including pizza, hot dogs, fries and more. Save room for the funnel cake, fries and popcorn too! Plus, there’s a heated dining tent where you can eat and warm up!

Families with young kids will want to make a stop at Santa’s Village at the North Pole. In this tent you get to meet Mrs. Claus and get your picture taken with Santa. Elmo was also inside available for hugs and pictures. This tent had the longest line of any attraction during our visit. Unfortunately, my 11 and 13-year-old would not go anywhere near this tent, even though it was heated!

Other attractions include Santa’s Reindeer, a hay ride that rides along the dam, and a train ride that travels around the Lights of Wonder display. There are a couple of game booths that have an additional cost.

The Lights of Wonder was my favorite attraction at Westchester Winter Wonderland. This is a large colored lights display that is choreographed set to holiday music. Each song has a different combination of lights. If it wasn’t so cold, I could have watched this all night long!

Make sure to visit Westchester Winter Wonderland before they close on January 4th! It’s a great way to enjoy some winter fun with the family!

(Thank you Westchester Winter Wonderland for hosting NY Foodie Family. As always, all opinions are our own.)

The Details:
Westchester Winter Wonderland
Kensico Dam Plaza
1 Bronx River Parkway
Valhalla, NY 10595

Hours: Fridays (5 PM -9 PM) Saturdays (4 PM – 10 PM) and Sundays (4 PM – 9 PM) November 29 – December 22
Monday – Friday (5 PM – 10 PM) Saturday & Sunday (4 PM – 9 PM) December 23 2019 – January 4, 2020
Closed Christmas Eve and Christmas Day

Tickets:
$20/ticket, Free/children ages 3 and under
Tickets can be purchased online ahead of time and are good for any day that Westchester Winter Wonderland is open. You can also purchase tickets when you arrive.

Parking:
Free – plenty of parking

Tips:
*Get there early to beat the crowds

*Dress warmly! All attractions are outside, except for Santa and the Winter Wonderland Circus. It was very cold the night we visited and we wished we had worn warmer socks and winter boots!

*Food is available for purchase. For price reference, funnel cake costs $6, fries cost $4 and a small cotton candy costs $6. Most food vendors accept both cash and credit cards, but there is an ATM if needed.

*Beer and wine is available for purchase.

*Strollers are not allowed in the circus tent and there is a stroller parking area.

Five on Friday {…’tis the season to be jolly….}

Posted on December 13, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

Happy Friday! It’s lucky Friday the 13th! Christmas is less than two weeks away and we are busy, busy, busy! This weekend is filled with Christmas festivities! I am going to a friend’s annual holiday party Saturday night and then Sunday we have our annual supper club pizza and cookie exchange. Here are five from this week:

1. A Christmas Carol – last weekend we traveled up to Kingston to see the Ulster County Ballet perform A Christmas Carol. The dancers were so talented and did a great job. It was a nice way to celebrate the holiday season!

2. Westchester Winter Wonderland – This past weekend, Westchester Winter Wonderland hosted us at their annual event. This outdoor attraction is filled with lights, music, rides, entertainment and more. Stay tuned for a future post. We had a fun time, but it was so COLD!!

3. Reading – I have been reading all the holiday themed books this month. I am finising up Let It Snow by Nancy Thayer, which is a cute Christmas read that takes place on Nantucket.

4. Snow Beautiful – We had another snowfall this week and I ended up with a 2-hour delay and the kids had a 3-hour delay which was nice. The drive to work was so beautiful with the snow on the tree branches.

5. Holiday Prep – Our Christmas cards arrived from Snapfish and we are working on getting them addressed and stamped to mail out. Dana and I are heading out tonight to do some Christmas shopping. I’m really hoping it’s not too crazy.

ICYMI this week on the blog:

Tuesday I shared my November reads.

This week on the podcast we talk about Holiday Traditions. Then we end with our Quick Hits of the week!

Sharing with Friday Favorites! Have a great weekend!

November Reads {2019}

Posted on December 10, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

It’s December and I’m currently all about the holiday themed reads! But today, I’m sharing my November reads with Steph and Jana’s monthly book link up. I’ve been averaging 4-5 books a month and last month was no different, with five books read. Here are my November reads from least to most liked:

3 stars:

The Gifted School by Bruce Holsinger – This book revolves around four families that are great friends. They all have children in the 5th grade and met when the kids were babies. When a new public charter gifted school, Crystal Academy, plans to open, the parents end up going to extreme measures to try to get their kids into the middle school. The book is told from the perspectives of different characters in the story. It has been compared to Big Little Lies, which I really liked. Overall, I found this to be a decent contemporary fiction read and rate it more of a 3.5, if half stars were available on goodreads.

Little White Lies by Jennifer Lynn Barnes – Sawyer Taft’s estranged grandmother shows up at her door with an interesting proposition. Sawyer has to participate in debutante season and in exchange she will get a six figure award. Sawyer is immersed in an unfamiliar world of wealth and parties. As she upholds her end of the deal, she is also able to investigate her unknown birth father’s identity. This was a fun YA book that’s been compared to Pretty Little Liars.

Royal Holiday by Jasmine Guillory – Vivian Forest is accompanying her daughter on a work trip and is visiting England for the first time. On her first day there she meets Malcolm Hudson. He ends up showing her around the area and of course, a romance begins. But this is a vacation…..can/will they do a long distance relationship? I didn’t realize that this was the fourth book in a series, so it can be read without reading the others. I enjoy a good contemporary romance, but this was just an okay read for me. I found it very predictable and a little cheesy. This was my first book by Guillory, and I think I’ll pass on her others.

4 stars:

The Orphan’s Tale by Pam Jenoff – This book tells the story of two women, Noa and Astrid, who are trapeze artists in a traveling circus during WWII. This historical fiction book was last month’s read for my in-person book club and we all enjoyed it. I enjoy reading historical fiction, especially books about WWII. I enjoyed this book’s unique perspective of the time period, as I didn’t even realize that there were traveling circuses during this time. Definitely a book that you need to be in the right mind frame to read, but in my opinion, worth the time.

Something Like Happy by Eva Woods – Annie feels stuck in her miserable life. Then she meets Polly who is terminally ill, but living her 100 Days of Happy Challenge. She ends up recruiting Annie, which has drastic changes on both of their lives. Although not everyone may enjoy this book, I think there are takeaways that we can all use. This book is a good reminder to embrace life and live with no regrets.

Five on Friday {It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas….}

Posted on December 6, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

Hooray for Friday! New York had its first big snowstorm earlier this week which resulted in a snow day for the kids and I on Monday. It was nice to ease back into reality after our 8 night cruise. However, even with a shortened week, it felt really long! We had such a great time with my family on our cruise vacation. Read more below!

1. The Ship – We sailed on Royal Caribbean’s Anthem of the Seas. This was our third cruise with Royal Caribbean, our favorite cruise line. The ship left from Cape Liberty in Bayonne, NJ, a little over an hour drive from our house. We enjoy cruising out of New Jersey, which allows us to not have to fly. With the Thanksgiving holiday, the cruise was filled to capacity with over 4,000 guests. However, since the ship is so large, it rarely felt super crowded.

2. Eating – Umm, what weren’t we eating?! The kids enjoyed ice cream cones at all hours of the day. It was truly vacation for them, where they were eating dessert with every meal. I may have indulged in some creme brulee and other goodies myself! In the past we’ve been happy with the food on Royal Caribbean. Unfortunately, we weren’t wowed by the food on this trip. But of course, we still did our fair share of eating.

3. Warm Weather – It was so nice to be able to shed our winter jackets that we wore when we departed and enjoy the 75+ degree weather in Florida and the Bahamas. The kids loved seeing all of the palm trees and we all couldn’t believe at how blue and clear the water was down there.

4. Family – My husband and I called this trip Thanksgiving on the Seas. Normally, my sister hosts Thanksgiving in Maryland. But this year, we (my parents, brother, and my sister and her family) all decided to take a cruise together instead. We had a lot to celebrate this year including me and Dana’s 15 year wedding anniversary, my 40th birthday and my mom’s 70th birthday. Plus, Dana’s birthday was a few days before we left for the cruise. And while we were on the cruise my niece turned 7. It was fun getting to celebrate her actual birthday on the boat!

5. Disconnecting – While you can pay for wifi on the cruise ship, we opted not to. We wanted to fully disconnect and enjoy our vacation. And enjoy we did! While we were in port we left the ship and enjoyed excursions and the beach. When we were traveling down and back from Florida and the Bahamas we enjoyed all the Anthem of the Seas had to offer including bumper cars, the rock wall, the North Star and lots of great shows!

ICYMI this week on the blog:

Yesterday, I posted a recap of past Westchester County Experience Gift Idea posts.

This week on the podcast we talk about Holiday Experience Gift Ideas. Then we end with our Quick Hits of the week!

Sharing with Friday Favorites! Have a great weekend!

Episode 19 Podcast Show Notes: Holiday Experience Gift Ideas

Posted on December 5, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

We have a podcast! You can download and listen here:
Anchor
Breaker
iTunes
RadioPublic
Spotify

In this podcast episode we talk about Holiday Experience Gifts:
We refer to these past blog posts but have included some updated pricing below :

Holiday Gift Ideas for Westchester County Families (2016)

Holiday Gift Ideas for Westchester County Families (2017)

Experience Gift Ideas for Westchester County Families (2018)

Westchester Magazine $14.99/year
Hudson Valley Magazine $14.99/year

Westchester County Park Pass:
Individual – $90
Family – $180

Empire Pass:
$80 wallet sized card that can be shared

Bronx Zoo:
$155/family membership
$210/premium

Historic Hudson Valley:
$160/family

Hudson River museum:
$70 family

Maritime aquarium Norwalk:
$190/family

New York Botanical Garden:
$145/family

Quick Hits:
1. Pop-up restaurant The Elephant Tree coming in January

2. New Rochelle has a new cider tap room

3. Hudson Valley author writes Janis Joplin biography

4. New sandwich shop opened in Wappingers Falls

5. Best of Westchester nominations now open

6. Toys ‘R Us opens in Paramus after bankruptcy

Westchester County Experience Gift Ideas

Posted on December 5, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

It’s that time of year again, where we start making our lists of everyone we need to buy presents before. Before you run out and buy more “stuff” think about giving an experience gift this year. There are plenty of fun things to do in and around Westchester County. Check out some of these experience gift ideas! Below are links to past posts that offer a comprehensive list of Westchester County experience gift ideas! Even though some of the posts are a few years old, the ideas are still relevant. Only the prices may have changed. Please check websites for the current pricing. If you know of any experience gift ideas that we have not included, please let us know!

Holiday Gift Ideas for Westchester County Families (2016)

Holiday Gift Ideas for Westchester County Families (2017)

Experience Gift Ideas for Westchester County Families (2018)

Five on Friday {Bon Voyage}

Posted on November 22, 2019 by nyfoodiefamily@gmail.com

Hooray for Friday! We are super excited that we will be leaving for our cruise tomorrow! Tonight we are busy finishing up packing. Just a heads up, there will be no Five on Friday next week. I am truly taking a vacation. No work, no blogging, just relaxation and fun. Here are five from this week:

Reading – I am currently reading The Gifted School by Bruce Holsinger. It’s contemporary fiction about a group of friends who all are trying to get their children into the new gifted school opening in their town. So far, so good.

Celebrating– This week we celebrated Dana’s birthday. We didn’t go crazy knowing we had the cruise coming up. But we did go out for dinner and came home and had cheesecake to celebrate another year with our favorite guy!

Cooking – This week we made Spaghetti with Meatballs, Cod with Hoisin Glaze, served with Simply Mashed Potatoes and Sauteed Zucchini, Asian Turkey Burgers, Chicken Marsala over Pasta and homemade pizza.

Buying – last minute things for the cruise including waterproof cameras and a waterproof phone case. We found both on clearance at Walmart. I love a good deal!

Preparing – for the holidays. Since we leave this weekend and will be gone for 9 days I wanted to make sure we were prepped for the holidays. Last weekend we put the tree up and even got our Christmas card photo taken.

ICYMI this week on the blog: