Great thing of the day: Grateful Palate(.com)

There is a single website that has made Christmas dreams come true for many years now in my world... It has provided me with Bonus points for finding my boss' wife a gift, surprised my brother who thought that he knew everything about bacon, delivered gifts to far off locations just in the nick of time, and is always good for a surprise or two in the pork product arena.

The Grateful Palate, your one stop shop for all things bacon! (and all things generally Yum, as well).

And now - they have combo'd two of the best things on the planet - bacon and POPCORN! By now you probably know how much I HEART POPCORN, and the only thing that might take popcorn to a new level ~would be bacon!

YUM!



I'm not sure that I'm going to run right out and get a big ol' tub... but I just bought some great bacon from The Grateful Palate - and some Ham Dust - so I plan to spend a small part of New Year's Day Baconing and Corn-Poppin'!

Click here to find the easy path to salvation...
(photo from www.gratefulpalate.com)

no excuse!

this title acutally was about what the gist of my posting was about... but actually - it can also address coming back from europe and not saying a word!

However, getting unpacked, unjetlagged, unburied with the work my boss 'held' for me, getting un-sick (MB came back with a whopper of a cold), I have only had one small deep breath before getting SLAMMED by the *oh-so-joyous* (NOT!) holidays.

anyway... we had a fantastic vacation in Brussels, Amsterdam, and Paris... and sadly for as much fun as we had, all I can do is keep slapping my forehead thinking THAT's where we forgot to stop in at! or THAT's what we didn't get to eat/drink/buy! it's all so very sad....

so I'm going to create a list of what we didn't do in Paris

The "We didn't" list:

forgot to visit THIS chocolatier

and speaking of Chocolate... we didn't visit this one - that was on recco. from my friends at Cacao Portland - L'Etoile D'Or... which top food bloggers apparently adore... and the only shop to sell Bernachon Chocolate other than Bernachon in Lyon. AND I MISSED IT!!!

couldn't drink nearly enough wine (it was SO cheap! and much more delicious than at home... and less alcohol content, so it was a fizzy nice buzz instead of a MAKE THE ROOM STOP buzz after many glasses!)

walked by the shop, but didn't eat or buy Poilâne butter cookies, called 'Punitions' - but thanks to Smitten - I'm trying to perfect the recipe - unfortunately our comparison to the original is based on MB's eating of them long ago....

Never got my mouth around any Berthillion Glace... partly because everytime MB said something about fitting in a visit to the Glass Store - I thought he meant real glass - not Glace!!!! GRRRR....

Never even HEARD of Pierre Hermé - until I got back...

and that's all only just the Food things...



Let's not forget:

the skipped trip to Muji (justified by - they have it in NY and tokyo - not a Parisian specific shop)

forgetting I wanted to shop at Kookai

missing an 'up-close' of the Eiffel Tower

no time for the Dali Museum

not shopping at or drinking any Mariage Freres

staying at the Hotel designed by Christian LaCroix

wishing there was time to take a cheesy boat tour on the Seine...

and I'm sure MB and I will add more....

WELCOME TO THE PARTY!!! (part 2 in a series...)

JL! (a.k.a. Jean Luc Floresca "Sugar Baby" Uharriet)

Come on in - the water's FINE! btw - you picked some rock'n parents. Hope you like skewers, and lasagne, and soccer...

Born to Geraldine and Dan (SugarDanny) Uharriet - a.k.a. to their friends as DanGer.
Monday December 3rd @ 4:41 PM. He weighed in @ 7 lbs 13 oz and is 20.5"

not sure if those specs will make you a good soccer player or not, if not - there's always scrapbooking....but hey - we love you JUST the way you are JL.... can't wait to meet ya!