Tag Archives: dessert

Cinnamon Roses and a (Re)Start

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cinnamon rolls, roses, dough, homemade, diy, jessica's dinner party, recipe, yeast

The last year has been a very transitional time for me: saying goodbye to Paris, seeing my sister get married, and moving back to Korea.  I felt a bit up in the air, heading somewhere but nowhere in particular at the same time.  It took be awhile to find my grounding and to be honest I’m still adjusting to this new phase in my life. I was looking for a good moment to revive JDP, a pause in my life when I could get all my thoughts together and let everyone know what was going on.  But things are always changing, and life continually transitioning, if I didn’t jump in at some point I was afraid another ghost of a year would pass by.

I’ll slowly get around to all the new changes that have taken place since I last posted (one being that I started a new job!), but before getting there I wanted to kick start my new blogging momentum by changing the look of this site! There are still a few kinks to be smoothed out, and it will continue to undergo some changes, but I hope this is a good (re)start!
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A Cheesecake for the Conscientious Glutton

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jessica's dinner party, cake, cheesecake, birthday

January may not be the best time to post a new cake recipe, especially with all those new year’s resolutions to “eat healthier” and “lose weight.” However, deprivation is anything BUT what this site is about. Detoxes and crazy wheatgrass diets have never helped me achieve those goals in the long run.  Aside from the obvious: exercise regularly and eat balanced meals, the best strategy I keep for myself is: glutton prevention. It may sound funny, but I can eat a lot.  I always get my money’s worth at a buffet, and have at one point out eaten 99% of the people I know (adolescent boys included).  When I was 16 that was ok, but today not so much.

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Tarte Tatin and a New Year

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jessica's dinner party, tarte tatin, pastry, seoul, korea, eats

The start of a new year always feels like a pause between everything that happened in the past to all that lays ahead in the future.  There are regrets in what could have been but also hope for what can and will be. Usually I spend a lot of time suspended in this moment trying to neatly timeline my life in chronological order, but life is anything but neat and (chrono)logical.  Everything is intertwined, looping together from ahead, below, up, and behind. So instead of trying to unravel what will forever be tangled, I am deciding to focus on today, whatever knots it may hold from the past, present, or future.
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Dessert First: Green Tea Layer Cake and Ginger Brownies

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When it comes to dinner parties, I like to make dessert first.  In general, baking takes more time and careful precision than cooking.  So, before the kitchen becomes loud with banging pots and chopping knives, I like to have dessert completed.  The great thing about cakes is that it can be started a day in advance.  Usually, cake layers taste better the next day because the flavors are given time to rest and settle.  While baking is done the day before, I always frost and assemble my cakes in the morning of the day of the party.  I think frosting always tastes best the day it’s made.

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Doughnut Plant

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Please welcome guest writer Michelle who is a fellow foodie, phenomenal writer, and my one and only sister.  She is JDP’s special correspondent to the New York food scene!

New York is a gastronomical hub of deliciousness mixed with obnoxiously trendy restaurants serving mediocre food.  A challenge of mine this year is not to pigeon-hole myself by visiting the same familiar eateries I know, and instead, to seek out hidden, or in this case, not-so-hidden gems.

Doughnut Plant is somewhat of a celebrity with glowing reviews by self-proclaimed doughnut fanatics on Yelp.  Plus, it was not only “challenged” by Bobby Flay on Throwdown, but Doughnut Plant won.  So, this past weekend, I trekked down to the Lower East Side to check out this local favorite.

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