Gold-Star Tea.

The pretty porcelain plates and mugs with all the gold stars got their first use today... we had a Christmas tea for our friends L and J. They were so disappointed that they won't be able to come to the Christmas party, so I decided to invite them over for tea. I broke my own rule about not serving tea in a mug, just so I could use the matching star-covered mugs with those beautiful plates.

I baked a carrot cake, using a mix from Duncan Hines. My first mistake with that cake was following the recipe, which calls for a quarter cup of vegetable oil. I hate putting oil in cake--- it's too heavy, too calorie-ridden, and can have an after-taste. I usually substitute pineapple juice or yogurt or applesauce. But I must have had a left-over blonde moment from that wig I wore for Halloween, because I read the instructions on the box and followed them to the letter.

The result was a carrot cake with an after-taste. Even the cream cheese frosting (also Duncan Hines) couldn't cover it up. That was another mistake--- I was going to add real cream cheese to the prepared frosting, but I forgot to buy it and I was too busy to go out for just one thing. My husband and I both noticed the after-taste in the cake, but L and J thought it was delicious. L took a second slice, and I gave her most of the cake to take home to her husband. L's husband will be here at the party, but L will be recovering from back surgery that night, and her mom J will be taking care of her until she can walk safely on her own. They both told L's husband to come to the party so he can go back and tell them all about it.

Oh well.... next time, I will make a carrot cake from scratch. The Duncan Hines box had a pouch filled with raisins and dehydrated carrots, which gave the cake a homemade texture. Still, adding oil to that mix was a mistake... the same amount of yogurt or crushed pineapple would have been so much better. I wish we had real bakeries here... not the supermarket bakery counters, but a real German or Italian bakery, like we had up in NY. People here just don't know what they're missing. The Kroger cakes fly off the faux-bakery shelves at the store, and box-mix cakes with pre-made frosting are gobbled up as if they were made by angels. I just don't get it.

Anyway.... the "gold stars" plates and mugs were on the table, which I covered with a gold tablecloth (yard sale find). Flatware was gold (from a moving sale). In the center of the table, I had a large gold multi-pointed star (another yard sale). We had the tea and cake, four kinds of canapes (Nancy's Gourmet, frozen, and delicious-- tastes like you handmade each one of them), holiday candy in those cute little crape-paper cups, and pumpkin ice cream (which I served in cute little sherbet glasses with coconut-coated rims).

L walked around our house looking at all the holiday decorations, saying that without thirty extra people in the house, everything just looked different. L also told me that she has her family playing Charades now, whenever they all get together for birthday and holiday celebrations. She told me she was sorry to have stolen our Charades idea, but I told her that we had taken the idea from our family in Arizona. And besides-- great ideas are meant to be shared. L said she was happy to hear that because every time she leaves our house, she goes home and rearranges something so it looks like what I've done here.

Twenty-one more days till Christmas. Ready or not, here it comes. We're ready!