Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
I wish I had some jingle bells to ring because we are getting closer. We're getting closer to the holidays. Hi, I'm Jan Arden. I'm here with Caitlin Green, Adam Karsh. And it's the holidays. It's December and we are getting closer. The advent calendar is almost at the halfway point. Whether you're drinking a beer, doing a nail polish job,
wine a day they have. I mean, I talked about it at the end of, before Adam cut me off last week when I was screaming out advent calendar options. They have underpant advent calendars where you can get it. And I saw one the other day online that you get a bra every day. I'm like a bra every day. How much is that costing someone? Is that like...
Is that like a $2,500 advent calendar? Anyway, welcome, you guys. We're picking up right where we left off. That's what we're doing this year. As a tease, I was going to say, though, Julie joining us has the world's greatest advent calendar. She does, and we're going to talk about something that she calls the reverse advent calendar. So you have to stay with us to find out what that is. But of course, Julie would think of that because it's frigging amazing. How are you guys feeling? I know that, Caitlin, last week you were just like,
I don't care, I can't get ready, I'm not blah, blah, blah, which a lot of people agreed with. I got a lot of messages that are like, I'm with Caitlin.
I just don't want to run around. I don't want to spend three days in my car, driving from house to house, eating a toffee fay and then leaving again in the car. Yeah, I'm there and I'm staying there. This is just how I feel. It's how I feel. It's a little bit how I feel about Christmas every year, just because I think a lot of people too, like you work right until the end. And so between a busy job and if you have children and if you're maybe in another caretaking role for someone who isn't your child,
adding to this list is too much for people. And that's why, that's why you do see that this is like, I mean, both of my therapists are like, this is our season. Like this is when we do our work because it is so rife with expectations that the flip side of an expectation is disappointment. And I think a lot of people have a hard time with that. So I just was like, forget it. I'm not doing any of this stuff. I'm out.
I noticed on your social media, not because I'm stalking you, is that you went to a really nice gathering and did like a secret Santa the other night with friends. And I have to say, it made me smile so much. But seeing you with a group of people was like...
Life affirming. It just looked like you had the best time. It was so great. And it was a weird first time, you know, we've gotten together in this group, especially indoors. Like we've seen people outside. So that was, you know, and we did have to include kind of the caveat that, you know, we want everyone to be fully vaccinated and it would be great if you got a rapid test. And so every single person got a rapid test before they came out and it just makes you feel better. It sounds like,
certainly unfamiliar. Some people might think it's overkill, but we did what we had to do for everyone to feel comfortable because there are people in our group of friends who, you know, might be in a caretaking role for someone who has a compromised immune system, older relatives. And so you do it for them, not just for you. So what was the, how did the secret Santa go? What, what do you do? Like it was a group of about 20 people, right? 18, 20 people. Yeah, it was 24. Yeah.
Gosh, dang. I can't believe two years later we think that's so weird to see 24 people smiling and looking at a camera and having a nice get-together. So the Secret Santa, what did you guys do? Did you bring – everyone brought a thing and then the freaking race is on, right? Yeah. I think it's called the White Elephant, but it's like you – so there's 24 people, it's 24 gifts. You are handed a number between 1 and 24 and you get to steal all along the way.
So as you go and order, one person goes under the tree, picks out a gift. If the person who comes up behind them, so if number one picks something and it's a really great gift and then number five comes along, they can steal number one. It's like it becomes crazy and it's $50 limit. So it's not a lot of money. And, you know, you get extra props for being hilarious and coming up with a funny gift. And so we did have some funny gag gifts and it's just a good time.
Oh, it just, it looks so fantastic. Yeah. Um,
What are you guys doing? I know the Jewish thing is happening, Adam. Hanukkah just ended, actually. Hanukkah just ended. Hanukkah's over. So on Christmas Day, like the rest of the world... See, now I'm sounding like a complete idiot. So on the 25th of December, let's just leave it there. Will you guys have a special dinner? Or do you not even pay any attention to that? Or are you just like, we don't care, we're moving on? We'll probably do the...
stereotypical Jewish thing and order Chinese food on Christmas Day. As per my song that I shared with you last week. Yes! You know, we don't get to celebrate Christmas. I feel left out. I really do. I mean, I feel the joy. I do. Absolutely. But we don't do anything. It's weird.
There's no tree in our house. There's no turkey. There's no mashed potatoes. There's no nothing. And I've never been to a Christmas dinner, and I want to go to a real Christmas dinner one day. Feel free to invite me. I'll invite you to a Christmas dinner. But don't you think it's getting further away from the religious aspect of Christmas anyway? I personally do not have a friend that goes to Mass on Christmas Eve or day. I don't know anyone. Most of my friends have...
very much gone the other way from any kind of religious practice. They just prefer to be considered spiritual, but they're not following Catholicism or Judaism or Buddhism or any of the isms. They're just living their lives trying to, maybe they're following Brene Brown. Maybe that's what they're doing.
But I know what you mean. I don't. Maybe you guys could try having a tree and a Christmas dinner. I mean, what would be the harm in that? We could. We totally could. Typically, we do Chinese food. That's typically what we do. And that's a nice tradition to Chinese food Christmas dinner. I'm OK with that.
I bet Caitlin, that sounds good to you too. I would love that. I'm telling you one of the best Christmases that I ever had was I went and had Christmas dinner, although it was like a Turkey kind of dinner, but it was at a hotel that had a restaurant in it here in Toronto. So we had hotel Christmas dinner served in a restaurant by someone else that no one had to make or clean up after. And then we walked not far to the old Cumberland movie theater kind of in Yorkville. And we went to go see the least festive movie of all time,
The Wrestler. It was whatever year The Wrestler came out. And it was literally dinner and a show. And I was there. Jan, you know who's in the audience? Rick Mercer. What? I bet you any... I had to walk past him to get to my seat. I bet you... I hope he comes back on the show with him. At The Wrestler?
At the wrestler on Christmas day, whatever year that was. Are you listening? We want you on the show to talk about it. Yeah. Anyways, it felt like a cool Toronto moment. And you know what? It was busy. The restaurant was busy. The movie theater was busy. You know, it was just, it was busy. And I was, this is such a multicultural city with people who celebrate every single, you know, possible representation of holidays under the sun. And I was like, look at this.
again, flying in the face of what everyone tells us that you have to spend your entire month of December shopping and running around like a chicken with no head. You can also just go to a restaurant and then see a movie. Well, I mean, even since I was a kid, it's changed so much what people, what the traditions are and what people are doing with their families. I know so many families too, that are picking their kids up, uh,
and they're leaving town on the 23rd. I mean, maybe this is a bit pre-COVID, but they're going to Atlantis or they're going to Disneyland or they're going to Florida somewhere or they're going to the West Coast or they're going to the P. Like people are taking their kids and they were just going somewhere to get out of the, I guess, the chaos and the stress and the pressure of,
Trying to please everybody over a four day period. Yeah, that's it. It is like, I mean, I'm not trying to be a downer, but I think it's the reality of it for a lot of people and ignoring the reality feels bad. And it just is this is just not a simple holiday for some people.
It can be really taxing. And so I just say that if you love it and you're excited, do it. Have the best, biggest Christmas you want. And if you love running around to four different households, oh my gosh, go ahead. But also if you don't, really don't force yourself. This shouldn't be like a square peg into a round hole thing. I'll see you at the movie theater. Are you a re-gifter, Caitlin?
I have regifted things, but in the past now, mind you that like, I mean, okay. So fancy, fancy candle. Like I have been inundated with fancy candles throughout points in my life. I don't know why. And eventually I would have like a cupboard that would be filled with like, I'm talking $100 candles, like the diptychs of the world. And I think it's because I know a lot of people who work in fashion, so they kind of get them for free. So I get them.
And then I end up regifting them and people love them. Or wine, like if I'm going through a period where I'm not drinking wine that much or maybe it's a bottle that I don't like, but somebody else will really like it because it's actually quite nice. I'll regift a fancy bottle of wine and some candles. Yeah. I was reading a few days ago about a woman that regifted something. It was this blouse, but she regifted it to the sister that gave it to her
two or three years earlier, it really made me laugh because I just thought this was something that would so happen to me. So she had totally forgotten. It still had the tag on it, which to me makes sense too. She was going through a closet. She kind of got caught with her pants down, was ill-prepared, didn't feel like she had enough stuff for her sister. So when they went over there, she had wrapped it up. The tag was on it. She just never wore it. And she gave it to her sister. And I guess this fight broke out.
that was unbelievably uncomfortable upset the entire family ruined the dinner her and her husband and her kids ended up leaving like it was a real debacle I mean I would have laughed it off been like uh you gave that I gave this to you two years ago but maybe I I was trying to put myself in that position but what what would you what would you do
I would have to laugh because unless you really went to this crazy amount of effort and that was kind of the thing that you and your sister did were these really personal, heartfelt, well thought out gifts. And then she mailed it in that year and you didn't. I think then you might be a little hurt, but otherwise, like, who cares? Well, that's what I thought, too. But it just, you know, I'm one of those people. It was an uncomfortable story. So I just was cringing along with it.
I don't know what would be worse, being the person doing the gifting or being the person...
That received it. Oh, they're both kind of bad. They're both kind of bad. I wouldn't want to make anyone else feel bad ever. No. But you're both kind of feeling bad in a way because then you're realizing you gave someone something they didn't really want or like. So that feels crummy. And as the other person, you don't want to be seen as an ungrateful gift receiver. Yeah, that's a tough one. Is it terrible that I'm still such a fan of the gift card? I'm just such a fan of the gift card.
I'm trying to eliminate any kind of disappointment with people. My nephews, they love a frigging gift card. I too like getting a gift card. A friend of mine last year gave me, you know, 50 bucks at chapters or Indigo. I was thrilled. I'm like, she goes, I have no clue what you've read and what you haven't read, which is true. She's like, I wanted to go get you a book.
But she goes, I know you read so much, and I just was worried about if you'd read something. So a lot of people think it's impersonal. Listen, we'll talk about it when we come back. You're listening to the Jan Arden Podcast. I'm here with Caitlin and Adam, and it's Christmas all month long. It's the most wonderful, wonderful time of year With the kids jingle belling Everyone telling you be a good sheep It's the most wonderful time
Welcome back to the Jan Arden Podcast. We're very happy to be here. We're talking about Christmas, the holidays, Hanukkah, Chanukkah, Kwanzaa. We're talking everything festive for the next few podcasts because let's face it, I'm excited about Christmas this year. I really am. Last year I spent it by myself in my house with the dog. This year I don't even have the dog. And yeah, but I'm still kind of looking forward to it. I have a couple of friends dropping by.
Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, my brother who's been incarcerated for 28 years, he was paroled almost two years ago. He's still living in a halfway house. It's a very gradual thing getting back out there, but he's coming and he's so excited that I don't think he can even contain himself. And he's like, are we going to have Christmas music?
And is your tree up? I'm like, yeah, I got two trees up actually. And I think he's just like, I mean, he's 62 years old and he can't even get his head around just walking into that atmosphere because obviously 28 Christmases incarcerated was fairly dismal. Do you think that his excitement is rubbing off on you a bit? I do. He's genuinely...
It's made me feel like, well, geez, maybe I should be a little bit more... I want to make sure that I have some goodies out for him. He's already talked about what we're going to watch. Do you have that old... Can you get a hold of that old Charlie Brown? One with the great music and it's just...
It's just a completely different experience for him. So I'm happy about that. That's how I feel when we spend Christmas with kids. So, you know, if we're doing Christmas with adults, it's one thing. But if we do Christmas with kids, it's kind of like another level because they're so excited about it and they have all their little things around it.
And so I kind of, I think I enjoy that in a different way. People who are, people who love Christmas and get excited about it, it is contagious. Christmas excitement is definitely contagious for sure.
Is there smells or just like things that really ring true for you about Christmas? I know for me, it was just smelling the turkey in the oven and sage. I think it's the sage from the dressing that honest to God, any time of year I smell sage, it's like, oh my God, it's Christmas.
Yeah, the Christmas tree, obviously, that's the big one. But I would say two clementines remind me of the holiday season because they always seem to come out around this time. And it's not just about Christmas Day. It's like all the weeks leading up to it. And for some reason in my house growing up, there was always a box of clementines just around. And so whenever I smell that, I'm like, oh, Christmas. Like it just I really notice it.
I wonder how it became, like when you think about Starbucks and stuff like that, that
the flavors of Christmas, like peppermint is, isn't it's, it's Christmas sage, cinnamon, clove, ginger. And I'm just wondering who made up these rules and why is it Christmassy? And I love that Starbucks, you know, at the 30th of November cuts off all their pumpkin stuff and goes into the chestnut what cinnamon mocha, like, it's so weird. Nope. We're not doing pumpkin spice anymore. We're done that. We're now moving on.
Peppermint mocha latte. Fantastic. It is good. I do like a peppermint mocha latte. Shoka loka loka. Isn't there a song? That's Lady Marmalade. Thank you. Thank you. You'd be good in a game show with me, Adam. Isn't there a shoka loka loka song? Yes. It's Lady Marmalade.
No, smells really are great. Being a kid and just laying in bed and just anything coming from downstairs, even the smell of like carrots and peas and anything that was cooking. But it's so funny because you do it once a year.
And then you move on. Yeah. And then do you have, do you have any friends where like you hit a certain point in the year and at that point it just becomes a countdown until Christmas again? I feel like it tends to happen in like as a joke in August where they'll be like, Oh, only like so-and-so more days until Christmas. But then in September and October it starts to get real. And I'm like, I am not, I am not waiting for Christmas in September. I, I,
often, well it's so abstract but I think about what is this holiday going to look like 200 years from now?
Because the Victorian, you know, Christmas kind of evolved from winter festivals that happened all over the globe. And, you know, suddenly the, you know, Catholicism, Christians wanted in on the celebration. I mean, who doesn't want to celebrate in the dead of winter? Who doesn't actually want to stop, have a bonfire, the worst time of the seasonal year? Yeah. Humans have a way of coming up with things when we need them. Yeah.
We have ways of, we're like, oh, I could really use a something like this right now. And then we're like, let's create a tradition. And like everyone runs around and creates a tradition and we're like, it's been this way forever. And you're like, it was kind of serving a need. So usually there is some logic behind it. In this case, it's because it was dark. And like you said, nobody wanted to have to feed their animals over the course of winter. So they were like, well, we should, I guess, get rid of them all.
We don't want to waste it. Let's have a feast. And who doesn't like a party? I mean, I love that about humans. We've always liked to party no matter what. Since the dawn of time, we have wanted to celebrate. We've wanted to be completely gluttonous, alter our consciousness and just have a good time. Well, I love the thing that I really loved about looking at Christmases like in Victorian times, Edwardian times, is that everybody made stuff.
You made your kids a toy or you made, I know it sounds ridiculous, but just a hair ribbon or a metal door clacker. There's something about the whole beginning of this that was...
so much more authentic. I mean, and I just get so, I'm so over, they're already advertising Boxing Day sales. The sales are meaningless. But people, it's such a big thing and you go to the mall on a Boxing Day. I mean, I haven't been to anything like that for years, but I find it
kind of such in bad taste considering what's happening with the planet. I just find it like, guys, can you reel it in? Do you really need another big screen TV? Do you need, like what, I
I don't know. What are we trying to fill our time with? It drives me nuts. It's that like you're looking for that hit of that like happy hit that you get from buying something and getting a big deal and then telling everyone you got the great deal. And so it is it's addictive behavior and retailers certainly cater to it. But I will say again, the urgency to buy things, buy them now, buy them while they're on sale, buy five like that's it's imaginary. These things are always on sale now. They're
always on sale. So I just, you don't have to wait long until they're going to go on sale again. So after you've just had to cook and clean and wrap and do all these things, I don't see any sense in running out and shopping the next day. Like it's just, it's a lot. Well, here's a legitimate thing. Do you buy things in a particular color?
Like, do you buy toothbrushes in a particular color, cars in a particular color? And what is that color? Because this is a frequently asked question, apparently. Blue. Everything I own is blue. Really? Yeah, it's like my favorite. Like, I have a million blue shirts. Blue is my favorite color. Everything has to be blue. Okay. My car is not blue. My car is black. But blue. Yeah. Look at my water bottle. It's blue. Everything is blue.
Isn't that funny? Yeah. It makes you wonder why I don't, I definitely do not have a color. No, I don't think so either. I mean, black isn't a color, but I own a lot of it. So there is that.
I would say I am looking around now and going, oh, yeah, I exist pretty much like a black dot in a white space because my entire place is pure white, essentially. And I am always in black. So that is kind of what my. Well, you and Stevie Nicks. I mean, black is easy because you can look at your closet and not have to decide anything. The Toronto uniform. Are you telling me I have one minute left, Adam? I unfortunately am. Dang it, Adam.
Well, Julie Van Rosendahl is going to be with us today. So I'm definitely going to ask her some of these questions. I don't know if I'll get to the color question, but I'm quite perplexed by that, Adam, that everything's blue. I've never noticed it. So maybe I'm not really looking at you the way I should be.
This is like a gray-blue hat. I happen to be wearing a black shirt. It's not that I only, only wear blue, but pretty much the vast majority of my outfits and color preferences are blue. Well, here's a little odd thing. One of my nephews is autistic, and part of his autism is how he eats, but he only eats things that are a certain color. And that color is orange. Interesting. He's getting a C. So...
I'm not sure what that entails, but it's a lot of those fish crackers. Yes, the goldfish crackers. And they do have a Christmas version of that if you're interested. They have colored Christmas goldfish crackers. So I think they taste the same. Okay, we're going to be right back with Julie Van Rosendahl. Don't go away. We're celebrating the holidays. Julie's got a new cookbook out. She's going to tell us all about it. You're listening to the Jen Arden Podcast. Don't leave us.
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Sleigh bells ring, are you glistening? Nope, that's not right. In the lane, bowlers missing.
It's beaut... Nope, that's not it. You know, I think we're all familiar with the melodies of Christmas songs. Welcome, if you've just joined us in the last 31 seconds, you're listening to the Jan Arden Podcast. I'm here with Adam Karsh. I'm here with Caitlin Green. And our very special guest, please insert large crowd noises right here, Julie Van Rosendahl. Thank you.
Hello. We haven't talked yet. People have been asking about you, Julie, but you have been. Congratulations to you right now. Cookies That I Have Loved has been out about 10 minutes, and it is a runaway train success. Your Instagram stories of you stuffing like hundreds of books into manila envelopes is making me exhausted. People love cookies.
You know, it has been a crazy week. It's been a week. I've already talked to the printer about reprint because the bookstores are selling out before they get their stock. It's great. It's amazing. People are fantastic. And they're ordering multiple books. I'm trying to sign them all. And this is the thing. I've got a bunch of people working stuffing envelopes, but they can only ship them as fast as I can sign them. So it's fantastic. Yeah.
Well, I noticed you were on your second package of Sharpies. Yes, a dozen. I burned through a dozen Sharpies already. Isn't that crazy? At your Sharpie company, Julie and I would not say no to a Sharpie sponsorship. That would be a great sponsorship. Tell me, what prompted you to write a book about cookies? Yes, everyone does love cookies. Yeah. But what made you do it? Well, you know, I don't talk about it very often, but I had a cookie bakery back in the 90s.
It was called One Smart Cookie and it was low fat cookies because that's what people cared about in the 90s. And now we know better. But so my first book, which I published in 1999, was a cookie cookbook. And so, you know, during the pandemic, I was actually working on a different book, a couple of them, because I cannot focus on one project at a time. I was working on a bean book and another book. And I just that things were not working for a lot of reasons.
And at one point I thought, you know, I've got a ton of cookie recipes already. People love cookies for Christmas. You know, people are baking more. People are baking at home during the pandemic.
It makes sense 21 years later to do another cookie book. And I don't have to start from scratch. I've got so many recipes that I've been making for decades. I don't have to, you know, do as much testing. So I went through, I culled my collection, photographed them, pulled together a book and had it printed in Canada. So it was a quick turnaround and
And it's a small format book. So it was fairly easy to put together. I mean, not easy, but fast. Faster than traditional publishing, big books, big publisher printed overseas.
And I don't even know what your question was. You asked me something. I hope I answered it. You absolutely did. I love the fact that you printed it in Canada. And I love the fact of your beautiful spine that also was in your previous cookbook, that you see the beautiful blue stitching go through there. But the format, too, you just mentioned the smaller format. You're...
Person that I know has probably thousands of cookbooks. And I think we all need something a little bit smaller to stick on our cupboards these days. Anyway, I love it small because it feels like a novel. Well, you know, when you look at, I love cookbooks and there are so many beautiful ones right now, but they're all sort of the same size and the same price point. They're kind of 30 to $50. And, uh, you know, I, there wasn't anything in this sort of smaller, uh,
you know, journal size. I mean, who, who makes a hundred recipes out of a book? Not very many people. So 36 recipes and the exposed spine, it created a lot of drama with my last book. So it's because they thought it was damaged. People thought it was damaged and I got so many emails. And of course people who didn't know understandably messaged me, but so it's got this exposed spine with the blue thread, I think makes it look more intentional, but most importantly, it's,
It lies flat on your countertop, which is important to me. You know, you have to be able to use your book and you don't want it to piss you off in your kitchen while you're baking because you're trying to put your like sack of flour on your book to keep it open while you're baking. So it was a, it's a design feature. Somebody really great last Christmas gave me a frigging awesome cookbook holder opener. And that somebody's name was Julie and it's sitting there.
My counter right now, it's this beautiful piece of wood. So, you know, my house is so woody, but I use it constantly. It's got little clever clips that you just set your book on there and you clip it open. So I use it all the time, but I get what you mean about the laying flat. Congratulations on the success of this. It has just been, it really is a runaway hit. I know people say that a lot, but wow, Julie, it's your success.
place in the community your place in people's hearts and you make effing great easy to understand recipes in your cupboard recipes well thank you you know it's you don't want to send people running around the city looking for strange you know ingredients that they might not necessarily have or they're going to use a teaspoon of milk or oat milk i have oat milk i have
No, I said goat milk curd. Yeah, there's no goat milk curd in these. And ingredients are expensive these days, and we can't go to the grocery store as easily as we used to. So very straightforward. And only available at independent publishers or independent booksellers, which that is another...
thing because we have to support our local small businesses. Yeah. And who doesn't love going into a little indie bookstore, the smell, the, I mean, one of my biggest, I guess not a fear, but concerns in life is that I will never read all the books. And I think of that because I'm going to be 60 years old next year. And I'm like,
Even if I live to like 75, maybe 78, something like that, I don't have a lot. And I'll never buy all the books. I know. You have FOMO, right? Book FOMO. I have book FOMO too. And I always have stacks beside my bed on both sides and then over by my reading chair.
And I get overwhelmed. Like I'm into one book, but I'm like, this is so big. I'm not going to finish it. I need to start this book, but I can't do that. We'll call it BOMO. BOMO, book FOMO. We have, you heard it here first, everyone. BOMO. I have BOMO. And the food too. So much food to eat. So little time.
Well, I'm going to do my very best to conquer that. When Caitlin and I today were talking about the smells of Christmas, we've kind of dedicated the next few podcasts running up to Christmas about Christmas and the holidays and Hanukkah and traditions around the holidays with everybody. Is there smells that come to mind for you that are that quintessential it's Christmas time? Christmas smells. Well, the Christmas tree. I grew up with a fresh, getting a fresh Christmas tree every year.
It's kind of freaking me out a bit that I have not seen a tree lot yet this year. And I know there's shortages and a lot of them come from BC and there's, you know, all the big retailers aren't doing them this year. I went and spent way too much. I spent $110 on probably the smallest tree I've ever had. Oh, wow. But I love the smell. At Bridgeland Market, a local store, so I'm happy to do it. But I love the smell of a fresh Christmas tree. But also, of course, the baking, right? The food, the cooking, right?
the smells of the mincemeat simmering on the stovetop and my grandma's marmalade cookies and ginger cookies and
Yeah, smells are big. Did you do cookie exchanges, Julie, with friends? I used to. I had a neighbor who did them for years and all the neighbor people would get together and swap cookies. And then I stopped in recent years because I just didn't have time. Christmas is a really busy time for me because everyone's baking. And I ended up with, you know, come home with 12 dozen more cookies and I didn't have time to make all the cookies. Yeah.
But I haven't been doing it during the pandemic. I have been doing door drops. I love door drops. That's one of my favorite things about this pandemic. So I know a few people who are doing cookie swaps by door drop.
And I like doing a log of cookie dough. I love the cookie dough idea. You know, that you just roll it up, tie it up, and people get it. And let's face it, it's cold enough outside in Alberta right now that everything's going to stay pretty fresh. Right? And people can bake them at their leisure. You see a dog walking down the street with a roll of cookie dough in his mouth. Yes. That could happen. But, yeah, put it in the mailbox. And...
You don't need that many cookies baked at once. Anyway, the freshly baked cookies are better. You can bake a few in your toaster oven or your air fryer. You don't need to bake two dozen at a time. Not everyone has a huge family at home. So I love the idea. And then it's less baking for the person who's making all the dough logs too, right? You just make them.
And for those of us who live alone, you're listening to the Jan Arden podcast. We're here with the wonderful Julie van Rosendahl, Caitlin, Adam. We'll be right back. Don't go away. Welcome back to the Jan Arden podcast. Julie van Rosendahl is here. Um,
Is everything ready for Christmas for you, Julie? Like, are you a big shopper? Are you a regifter? What are you? What's happening? How are you prepping for, what is it, two weeks away now? I can't even wrap my mind around it. It's so close. And I keep panicking that I, right, I have to buy things for people. Fortunately. Well, you don't.
My family, you know, and I only have one family to worry about. I heard Caitlin talking about, you know, last week her friends with four different families to coordinate. So it's just, you know, my parents and, you know, my sisters, we do books and socks is our thing.
That's what we buy for each other. So it narrows it down. It's easy. I trying to shop for a 16 year old. My teenager is hard. So there's this anime book. They just want money. Yeah, but that's not, you know what I got, you know what? I got him. He's not going to be listening to this. A friend of mine was cleaning out his basement and he found an original game boy with no right in the case with games.
And he was like, oh, no, I'm not going to use it. You can just have it. I tried to buy it from him. And he's like, I am excited about it.
Because I remember being hooked on Tetris on Game Boy. So I've got that. So I've got a couple things. Adam is showing us something. For everyone listening, Adam is showing us a... Is that a Game Boy? Original packaging. What? Original packaging. I mean, I've opened it and used it when I got it. And I think, oh, $89.90.
But original, original. This is first generation Game Boy. I have it. I don't know if it still works because I haven't used it. So what have you guys looked into the how much that would get on? I don't know. I don't want to sell it. I want to keep it. Yeah, I have not looked.
But, yeah, I just, I don't know. It's strange. It's another, you know, another pandemic Christmas and the, you know, no Christmas parties and the no tree lots this year. So I'm relying heavily on food. I'm just, you know, I'm eating mincemeat on my oatmeal every morning and eating cookies. I think there's still a lot of people out there that are like, oh, I don't want to have meat in a pastry. And I'm always like, well, I don't think it's actual meat. Do you have any?
on the background or the history of mincemeat and why it's called mincemeat? Well, every episode we're solving a problem. Last week, as you might know, it was the Yule log that was like... I have an excellent Yule log story that involves squirrels.
I know Adam, I can feel his Googling fingers, Googling the history of mincemeat, but it did originally have mincemeat. It had suet and people often go find suet, which is beef fat at butchers to put in their mincemeat. I don't, you don't need it. You can put butter in it if you like, but it's mostly just fruit, chopped up fruit, dried fruit, apples. I rescued a flat of
underripe nectarines this year that had been in cold storage for too long and made that into mincemeat and spices and brown sugar, you know, and people make it boozy with rum or brandy. Apple brandy is delicious if you like it boozy. I don't because I put it on my oatmeal every morning and my mom doesn't like things boozy. So I never did the boozy fruitcake, the boozy mincemeat. But, you know, when you explain it that way, people are like, oh, that sounds delicious. And it is. It's just funny that
Oh, mincemeat, I guess. Because I thought of that when I was a kid. Now, when you woke up Christmas morning with your sister, what did the day look like in the Van Rosendahl household? I mean, obviously, it was exciting, but what was that day like? My parents like to torture us first thing in the morning. So my sisters and I would have to clean our rooms, get all dressed nice. We would not fight. We would sit on the stairs and sing Christmas carols until my parents woke up.
And then we would go downstairs opening our stockings and then we'd have to have breakfast before we got to the presents under the tree and we'd have to do the dishes and all that. So it was very like stretched out. There wasn't that like mayhem of tearing open packages. So that really would have been trying my patience as a child because we just ran to the living room and I remember one year my little brother, Pat,
I mean, he was little, little, like probably four years old. And he got up probably at four in the morning and he opened everything. Oh.
So my mom got up like an hour later to a pile of ripped packages. Well, I didn't know whose was whose or what the tags were off. I don't even know what. I can't remember. But I know that it probably was very stressful for her to try and tape everything back together. Well, and it had to be one by one. It was very stretched out. And we...
we didn't have any relatives in Calgary growing up. They were all out in Windsor. And, and so it was just our family, you know, the very odd time we went out to Windsor for Christmas, but not very often. So yeah,
Did your mom, your dad do the cooking? Who was involved? My mom did. Well, I did. I did a lot of it when I was a kid. I just loved cooking. I've loved cooking since I was... My mom said, when you can learn to read a recipe by yourself, you can cook by yourself. So I've been cooking for a long time. So yeah, it was the traditional turkey dinner with all the stuff and the fruitcake from the joy of cooking, which I still make.
And it's very easy to veganize. Fruitcake is labor-intensive. It's not. I mean, it is, but I enjoy the process as much as anything. You know, I love cranking the Christmas music and making the fruitcake. I don't make a ton of them. I usually make, you know, a few. And, you know, it's not that tricky. I mean, it has to bake for a long time. It's a solid cake.
But it's like, it's like a holiday energy bar. It's, you know, and I eat it all day long. It's like, it takes me through the holidays. Fruit and nuts bound together by just enough batter to hold them into a sliceable cake. And, and I don't, I don't soak them in booze. I just, yeah, I just, I make them at Christmas time. I don't do it months in advance.
I love them. I love a dark fruitcake. No cherries, no candied cherries. Julie? No. The dried cherries, yes. Like the neon green and red cherries, I don't put those in fruitcake. And the little candied mix, you know what it actually is? Not the citron, but the little bits, rutabaga. Rutabaga is the vehicle for the sugary syrup. They're just those little bits. So you have to get the actual candied citron.
And it has much more better flavor. It's not just decorative. I would be remiss not to touch before we have to say goodbye. This always goes so quickly. You do something so brilliant. I know we spoke about it last year, I think. The reverse advent calendar. And it warms my heart. It makes me so proud of you. Of course, you would think of doing this, of putting an item in a box each day instead of chocolate every day leading up to Christmas and for the food bank. Well, for any food bank.
Any organization. And it's something we started years ago, you know, when Willem was younger and I had an empty wine box separated into the 12, you know, sections in my kitchen. And I thought a couple of these is 24 compartments. We could put something in each one, you know, and you choose a recipient. It could be a shelter, socks fit in, toques, underwear, toothbrushes.
you know, pasta items. And it gets kids in the habit of thinking about what could be useful for other people. It's inexpensive. Not everyone can afford to write a check. You don't have to deliver it on Christmas Eve. There's always a need. You can wait until after Christmas and drop it off wherever, wherever, even schools, even your local school. You know, there's there's need everywhere. I just love that you're doing that. And there's still time to absolutely do that. You know, we were talking about Advent calendars earlier.
last week, just how many different varieties they are. But, you know, when I saw this on your social media stories, it just really made me smile from ear to ear thinking about what a great idea it is. And you're right. I mean, Willem,
I'm sure has been surrounded by your thoughtfulness all his 16 years. It's just a great thing to do. You've been amazing to the community. You've been one of the stars, I think, just really leading with kindness and compassion and generosity. And a lot of people look to you this last year and a half, Julie Van Rosendahl, for
Just food and baking and comfort. And thank you for doing the show today. I wish we had more time. Maybe we can talk to you again before Santa's sleigh flies through the air. That'd be awesome. But thank you. Thank you. I love chatting with you guys. Well, we'll talk to you soon. You've been listening to the Jen Arden Podcast. What do we do? This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.