After the xmas eve party at my place, the very next day we headed to Gareth and Kim’s for a big feast. We were promised a home cooked dinner by Kim, but boy were we surprised by what was in store for us.
The dinner was for some 2 dozen people, but I believe there were enough food to feed at least two rugby teams, including reserves!
the dinner schedule, check out how many dishes here
First, just look at the schedule above to get an indication of the work needed for this epic dinner. Preparation actually started more than a day in advance (for the food alone), and longer if you count in buying groceries, gifts, and extra table/chairs for everyone.
chicken with pigs in blanket, bread, and cocktail shrimp
The photos you see here are some 70% of the dishes served, there are some that somehow escaped the lens. As far as I remember, here are what we were served:
the super excellent pork loin and ribs
It was impossible to pick a favorite, everything were awesome. I can make use of some ribs and pork loin right now (or anytime) for sure!
Recipes of some of these dishes can be found at http://www.kimberlycun.com/category/homemade-recipes/
Kim includes photos of each step for her recipe too, super easy to follow. This entry is on the pork ribs we were served, I believe.
salad, couscous, and more
In the original schedule, apple crumble was supposed to come out at 8:45, but thanks to everyone being overfed with all these awesome dishes, desserts didn’t make their way out until 11:45 pm.
Of course, nobody complained, 3 more hours to digest is a good thing. 
seafood bisque and desserts
As with the slightly more mature theme this year, no one passed out from drinking too much, though many almost have a coma from all the food.
we were all very well fed at the end of the night
At the end of the night, Gareth & Kim played Santa & Santarina and distributed carefully chosen gifts to everyone. That was especially a sweet touch, thanks guys, and lets do this again next year and every year.
and everyone got a gift from the hosts!
The first xmas eve party that I hosted was all the way back in 2005, which actually didn’t feel at all like it was already 6 years ago, with everyone still talking about Douglas’s epic puke fest after having one drink too many.
After last year’s absence (we spent xmas eve at Suan’s), the 5th installment of xmas eve party at my place resumes, and this time around we decided to have it back to basic – without the buffet line, satay man, or sponsored beer.
A big thank you to everyone who shows up, and even bigger thank you to those who brought alcohol and home made red velvet cupcake (Lainey) to share.
Horng, Haze, Terence; Aaron, Ruby, Derek; Terence & Celine
Those who came before in previous years:
KY, Haze, Terence, Horng, Suan, Ruby, Eiling, Michael, FA, Ringo, Ginny, Arthur, Yee Hou, Gareth, Kimberly, Huey Fang, Chan, Kerol.
Newcomer this year:
Lance, Melissa, Michael (yep 2 of them), Li Ling, Lainey, Aaron, Zach, Vinn, Pearl, Derek, Celine, Yuki.
Eiling & KY; Lance & Melissa, FA, Michael & Li Ling; Michael & Ringo
Unlike previous year’s crazy binge drinking style, this seems to be the year where everyone sorta take things slightly more maturely. Everyone was just having a good time, sipping some single malt whisky or having a cold one.
No, there is no beer bong this year, and if you want to look at pictures of people passing out, I’ll have to disappoint too. Some might say this is a sign of old age, hmmmm…
Yee Hou & Ginny; Ruby; FA; Lainey; Suan; Haze; Robb & Zach
The gift exchange part tho, was as fun as ever. Every year we had this rule, and I highly recommend that you do the same for your xmas gift exchange. I initially got this from working at Unisys in Cincinnati (man that was over 10 years ago)
Gift exchange was again the highlight of the night – best was the 1kg bacon
In essence, having the last number usually means you get to pick anything that’s opened, with only one unknown gift. However, even the last person can get his/her gift snatched if she (A) snatched B, then B snatched C, but C can actually snatch back A’s gift.
Loads of fun, try it.
The most snatched gift this year was from Lance & Horng – who contributed a whole 1 KG bacon and a small water feature thing. Those gifts exchange hands at least half a dozen times.
The funniest gift tho was from Robb, and drew by Kerol (after what she chose initially got snatched) – two bundle of bananas!
fire works; Gareth telling stories; bacon; Kim & Michael
I prepared a bit of BBQ (20 wings, some sausages) for those who happened to be hungry, Lainey brought her home made red velvet cakes (super yummy!), and at the end of the night we bbq some bacon too.
And no, this year we did not have any cops coming to end the party. Now that’s a first.
Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year!
Ladies and gentlemen, today yours truly don on chef’s hat and pretend that I know something about cooking. The recipe you are about to read comes from the Southern part of the country that likes to police the world. Yes, that would be U S of A.
We are going to learn about fried okra, on of my all time favorite beer food that isn’t served in any restaurant this side of Pacific.
fried okra ingredients – okra, pepper, salt, egg, milk
First, the ingredients, and they are fairly simple:
fried okra makes for awesome beer food
Then, the steps, this is child’s play in terms of cooking, no post graduate degree in culinary field is required:
This is one yummy snack that goes very well with cold beer, Kilkenny, Heineken, Guinness, anything! I brought this as my contribution to Suan’s xmas eve potluck, and was happy that it was well received. Even master chef Lance liked it, and that is plenty good for me
mimi bacon pizza by Haze
Haze came up with this concoction that she called mini bacon pizza. The ingredient’s pretty straight forward:
Steps:
The result certainly did not disappoint either, I liked it a lot too!
clam chowder (Lance), bacon pasta (Suan), roast chicken (Kim), sausage (Horng)
Lance brought a pot of clam chowder that had uses some sort of bacon stock, it was by far the best clam chowder I’ve ever had! You can actually order it at bbq-addicts.com, I guarantee that you’ll be 100% satisfied!
Suan cooked up some bacon carbonara that turned out to be the best pasta she’s ever made, Kim too roasted a chicken, very juicy, and tasted plenty awesome right out of her new oven! Horng made some sort of east-meet-west sausage for the potluck.
xmas eve party at Suanie’s crib
The little get-together over xmas eve turned out to be a very gastronomically satisfying event. We had a little bit to drink (there’ll be plenty more for NYE in a few days’ time at Michael’s), and spent the night reliving the old tradition of watching Euro Trip all over again.
So how was your xmas?
A big merry xmas to everyone, and thank you for coming to the party and made this 6th installment of the annual xmas eve party at my humble little place as happening as successful as ever!
Thanks to the power of Robb & Nuffnang, this year we had Heineken sponsoring the house party with plenty of beer, a canopy, and even food (including freshly grilled satey!). Suanie also got her friends from thebaloonimages.com to decorate up the place with plenty of balloons too!
Hence, this year we had the whole works, nice decorations, food, drinks, and even party kits! My house almost looked like a wedding kenduri from far. But it was awesome.
did you notice the satey man?
From the facebook photo album tags, there were over 45 or so people in attendance. There were lot of old faces from previous parties turned up, and quite a few new comers too.
The previous attendees were: Suanie, Kerol, Gareth, Kim, Ee Laine, Horng, Yee Hou, Terence, Huey Fang, Hwa Chai, Wei Yi, Michael, Elfie, Rachel, Selina, Tock, Rebecca, Jaime, Janice, Shiang, Wai Meng, Reta, Mohan, Eiling, and Zoe.
New comers include: Haze, Robb, Tim, Audrey, Su Ann, Suet Li, Eric, Jaclyn, Ruby, Nazrul, Richard, San San, Nigel, Li Ling, Thomas, Arthur, Ginny, Desmond, and Vanessa.
Brief encounter: Reta’s bf, Eric, showed up for a bit to pick her up, as with another Wai Meng who had to send Elfie back earlier cos she wasn’t feeling well.
Oh.. and the petrol car came by with a cop, followed by 2 petrol cars some 15 minutes later with 3 friendly police officers asking us to .. tone it down at about 2 something in the morning.
turkey and roast pork for xmas eve dinner
Just before the party got started, the #porkgang actually prepared a nice dinner with a big turkey, a couple kilograms of roast pork, vegetable, bacon pasta, and even butter bread puddings for ourselves. Jaclyn and Kim did most of the cooking while Terence handled the roast pork business, and boy, everything was so delicious!
That got us all ready to roll for the party.
don’t you want to look like a green superhero too?
As usual, most guests came later than the official 8:30pm start time with the exception of a few. Traffic on the day was pretty horrendous too, so I guess that could be served as an excuse of sort.
There were plenty of cold Heinekens to go around, and inside the party pack were some pretty cool costumes too. We had quite a bit of fun with those, until it started to feel a bit too warm to be wearing capes and hats… oh well.
the bong made quite a few ppl sprayed back out its content
Ever the inventer, Terence brought a home-made bong to the party and was trying to convince people to try his concoction via the funnel. I don’t think anyone actually managed to swallow the drinks without at least spilling half of it on the floor.
Absinthe + beer isn’t exactly a very desirable taste, especially when it’s channeling through the pipe directly to your throat, I supposed. Huey Fang and Hwa Chai probably sprayed 90% of it on the floor.
and the gift exchange got started!
We got the gift exchange started by 12 am, right when Super Late Su Ann arrived.
As with every year, everyone draws a number (40 gifts intotal this year), and then system works this way:
we had bak kua, godiva chocolate, tumbler, and even cigarettes *gasp*
The person with the smallest number usually lose out, the one with the biggest number has highest advantage, theoretically speaking anyway.
With the rules in place, there were a lot of gifts exchanging hands (most of the time very reluctantly). It was to the point where we had to start limiting the exchange since some rounds had over 7-8 hijackings.
Haze wasn’t too happy with Penang Asam Laksa, but liked the War Craft
Among the most sought after gifts were a set of banana republic cocktail shaker, a really nice laptop bag, original war craft games, bak kua, Haze’s painting, Starbucks planner, and the geometrical rubik’s cube.
The more unfortunate gifts were adult diapers, giant rubber chicken, tiny toy guitar, and shaver.
The most unorthodox gift was from Yee Hou, a few packets of Asam Laksa he tapau all the way from Penang on the same day!
emotional roller coaster, you thought you get to keep those gifts? hijacked!
The gift exchange took over 1.5 hours to get done, but it was really the highlight of the night, I thought it was very fun!
We continued to party for a little while, and started winding it down after the cops came for the second time. For whatever reasons, these dudes actually cheered when the petrol car showed up for the first time. The party wouldn’t have been complete then I supposed.
Oh, by the way according to his tweet, Yee Hou puked when he got home after drinking only one beer at the party, hohohoho.
Thank you guys for coming and made this an awesome party, lets do it again next year!
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Just like the previous 5 years, I’m hosting another X’mas eve party this year at home, and the sixth annual party has Heineken providing plenty of cold beer for everyone, they’re the sponsor.
This house party thingy is starting to get more ridiculous, awesomesauce!
see? Heineken hat, last year’s good omen came true
Anyway, this year’s theme – GO GREEN!
Everyone is required to wear at least something green, be it a hat, a string, shirt, skirt, bikini (you’re not allowed to swim in the pond), or whatever. There will be certain consequences for those who fails to adhere to this theme, you have been warned.
The GIFT EXCHANGE draw -
Be creative, bring something interesting!
Party usually ends when all the drinks are consumed, or when the cops decided to pay us the 2nd visit.
I have created the event in facebook and started the whole invitation process, slowly (cos there’s limited space at my small house and I am also bad with names). Add me in facebook if you want to join us, I will try to accommodate as much as possible.
For those who received the invitation and still hasn’t responded yet, please do so ASAP.
Past party reports are here. Some of the highlights in previous parties include Kim picking a toilet seat cover for gift, HB showing something nobody really wanted to see, Patrick being drunk silly and fell down everywhere without spilling a drop from his wine glass, and Suan randomly led a group of people into singing really lousy x’mas carol on the street.
