Holiday Dinner club

The holidays are here, and seem to be passing us by so quickly; but we had an opportunity to get together for dinner club.  As usual, we had some amazing food, great conversations and delicious drinks!  This year, we decided that each of us would bring a friend, who could share in our food and festivities.  

Even though it was held in the evening, our theme for this month was brunch, I mean who doesn't love brunch food at any time?  Once again, everyone out-did themselves with the food, and a few people were smart and wore stretchy pants...wish I was smart!  

Mary started off the night right with a delicious holiday drink!  It was a simple syrup mixture with pineapple juice, and some other items to make a base (I'll post the recipe later), then you top it off with Champagne.  She also provided an appetizer that was a very fabulous shrimp salad appetizer.  It had Shrimp with tomatoes, olives, and a great dressing.  

For the main event, Carol, who was the hostess with the mostess, made a wonderful egg based quiche with bacon.  Now, if you remember, we have a rule in our dinner club that you aren't supposed to use a recipe you've tried before.  Well, Carol had tried this before, but it was a great tried and true recipe! 

Now, back to the food...oh yeah!  Ricki made a strata with spinach, that was absolutely fabulous.  Kathy brought a winter fruit salad, which I think I'm going to make and take to my family's Christmas dinner.  It was the perfect complement to the other heavy foods!  I made a coffee cake that was called 'The Best Coffee Cake. Ever.'  I was a little skeptical at first about if this was really the best coffee cake, but let me tell you...when I licked that batter off the beaters, well, I knew... this recipe was something special!  I also knew it after I found out that there are 3 sticks of butter in the recipe...wow, it isn't even a Paula Dean recipe!  This is actually a Pioneer Woman recipe, and here is a link to the recipe on her website:  Best Coffee Cake Recipe.  

Here is the recipe I used...you know I always have to make it my own.  

Ingredients:
For the Cake 

• 1 1/2 sticks butter, softened
• 2 cups Scant Sugar
• 3 cups Flour, sifted
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon Salt
• 1 1/4 cups Butter milk (original calls for whole milk, but I mistakenly bought buttermilk...turned out great!)
• 3 eggs (the original calls for egg whites only and beaten until stiff...I'm too lazy to do that!)

For the topping

• 1 1/2 sticks butter, softened
• 3/4 cups flour
• 1 1/2 cups brown sugar
• 2 Tablespoons Cinnamon
• 1 1/2 cups Pecans, chopped (I made spiced pecans to add an extra kick) 

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Sift together flour, baking powder and salt.  Beat egg whites and set aside.  
• Cream butter and sugar together.  Add flour mixture and milk alternately until combined.  Don't overbeat.  Lightly beat the eggs and add to the mixture with a rubber spatula.  Spread the cake mixture into a well-greased 9x13 baking pan (the original recipe stresses to use a pan with high sides or even a larger an 9x13 pan.  I had no issues with the cake overflowing...maybe that happens if you beat the egg whites).  
• In a separate bowl, combine topping ingredients with a pastry cutter until crumbly.  Sprinkle all over the top of the cake mixture.
• Bake for 40 - 45 minutes, or until no longer jiggly.  Server warm and enjoy!!

 Picture from the Pioneer Woman's blog: