Culinary Christmas - December 7: I Want A Hippopotamus For Christmas

Featured Foods: Vegetables

You'd think that with my affinity for things like "The Hippo Song" that I would have featured today's Steve's 25 Days of Christmas Music tune a lot earlier… but alas, I haven't. I'll even let you in on a little secret. Up until Thanksgiving of this year, I had never heard this song. I know, it's crazy given the extensive Christmas music collection we have.

During our Culinary Christmas celebration, we're trying to be as open as possible to include all the different types of food and drink. Today, we even accommodate those weirdos who refuse to eat meat. Because as sung by Gayla Peevey during I Want A Hippopotamus For Christmas, "Mom says the hippo would eat me up, but then // Teacher says a hippo is a vegetarian." So there you go. Personally, I think you may be better off throwing the whole hippo onto the fire and cookin' him up!

Continue Reading…

We're all pretty familiar with the 1965 television classic, A Charlie Brown Christmas. But how familiar are you with the other Peanuts specials that celebrate this time of year? In fact, there are 4 in all!

A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)

The "sequel" to the classic appeared some 27 years later when It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown hit the airwaves on CBS in 1992. Interestingly, this was actually released to video first, via an exclusive at Shell gas stations.

It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown (1992)

You can tell by watching that it tried to emulate the success of the original, and by doing so, failed miserably. Once you get past the annoying smooth jazz versions of Vince Guaraldi's music, you are treated to a plotline involving Charlie Brown trying to sell wreaths and buy gloves, Peppermint Patti attempting to get out of a book report, and yes, another Christmas play… with Scripture thrown in along the way. You'll never think of "Hark!" quite the same way after watching Sally practice her lines. Intended to be broadcast in a 30-minute timeslot for years to come, it was never seen on TV again. You can find it as a bonus feature on the DVD release for A Charlie Brown Christmas. It's not a great show, but it's fun to watch… kinda.

Continue Reading…

Culinary Christmas - December 6: Ding Fries Are Done

Featured Foods: Whoppers, french fries, apple pie

Welcome to a new week of Steve's 25 Days of Christmas Music, continuing our Culinary Christmas theme!

We now feature the song that totally ruined "Carol of the Bells" for me, because everytime I hear an instrumental version of that song, I instead sing the lyrics from today's tune. Yes, it's Ding Fries Are Done!

Continue Reading…

Culinary Christmas - December 5: In The Snow

Featured Foods: Stroh Rum

Now for something a bit different…

Stroh Austria GmbH is the manufacturer of spiced rum. To help expand the brand that's been around for over 170 years, the company created a promotional musical group called The Rumbar Girls. And with that creation we get today's catchy, dance/polka song called In the Snow (it even has a music video!)

So if you are looking for some alcoholically-oriented beverages to go along with our collection of Culinary Christmas tunes so far, then today is the day to drink up!

Continue Reading…

Culinary Christmas - December 4: Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!

Featured Foods: Corn for popping

Want some popcorn? Then Rosemary Clooney has some for you with her rendition of Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!!

You can tell she recorded this later in her career because her voice is much lower, there's a trademark "waver" in her voice, and she references her age in a modified set of lyrics:

Continue Reading…

Culinary Christmas - December 3: 12 Days of Christmas

Featured Foods: Pear, milk, geese, wassail, hen, boar's head

It's a no brainer that this "Culinary Christmas" theme would feature a version of the 12 Days of Christmas. You've got pear trees, geese, milk, and a bunch of other edibles. And if you've watched PBS in any capacity, you'll recognize today's artist, Straight No Chaser, as they have starred in numerous specials, usually designed to get people to contribute to their local station. After all, this programming is made possible by "Viewers Like You. Thank You."

Continue Reading…

Culinary Christmas - December 2: Chinese Food for Christmas

Featured Foods: Chinese food, latkes

So, let's say to decide to have a Steve's 25 Days of Christmas Music theme around food. Just how would you go about finding such music? At first I did a search of my existing Christmas music library (all 18GB of it) for songs with obvious references to food in their titles. But that only gets you so far. So eventually you start searching the Web with phrases like "Christmas food songs" and the like. Searches like that brought me to today's song, Chinese Food on Christmas.

This song was written in 2004 by a fella named Brandon Walker, who authored it for a songwriting class at James Madison University. In 2006, he recorded himself playing the song on piano and uploaded it to YouTube (Watch here). It turned into a pretty popular video, generated hundreds of thousands of views. The following year, he put together a professionally shot music video and again stuck that on YouTube (Click to view). This is what really put him over the top, as the song now has 1.7 million views. And that's the version that we're featuring today on the 25 Days.

Continue Reading…

Culinary Christmas - December 1: Christmas Dinner, Country Style

Featured Foods: Turkey, duck, bread, cider, ham, yams, chestnut stuffing, huckleberry muffin, cranberry sauce, cheese, pumpkin pie, mince pie, black-eyed peas

What better way to kick off Steve's 25 Days of Christmas Music for the 10th season than with a song that symbolizes just how crazy this "Culinary Christmas" theme really is. Thus, I present to you Christmas Dinner, Country Style. Bing Crosby made this a "Christmas hit" in 1963. Usually, I like to avoid Bing overload around this time of year because all we seem to hear over and over and over again is his rendition of "White Christmas". This is something quite different from that!

Continue Reading…

10 years? That's right. It's December once again and believe it or not, I'm exited to welcome you to the 10th annual edition of Steve's 25 Days of Christmas Music, a tradition we share via the TannerWorld Junction discussion forums, as well as here at SteveandAmySly.com, Facebook, and Twitter.

Yup, back in 2001, who would have known that I'd still be sharing Christmas songs all tied together with a single theme all these years later. What am I, crazy? Apparently so!

For those who are just joining us, here's what Steve's 25 Days of Christmas Music is all about. Starting December 1 through December 25, I'll be posting new music each day that you can download, no strings attached. It's all FREE, FREE, FREE! Songs will be in MP3 format — so you can listen via any media player or your iPod. It's just like an audio advent calendar, except that you won't have to fight with your dumb sister over who gets to open the next little door!

Continue Reading…

Every year, I build a village under our Christmas tree from scratch, using different materials and themes.

2009 Tanner Christmas Tree

For many years I used LEGO to create such villages as 'Pirates of the Christmas-be-an', 'A Tour of Jackhannesburg', and 'Christmas on Hoth'.

Continue Reading…