Good News

Good News is Hawaii's favorite candy bar and the packaging makes it the PERFECT favor for a baby shower. Place one at each place setting or send them out with the invitations to alert everyone to the Good News! If you are not in Hawaii, you can order them online HERE. 

PS. Although this is a great idea, it is not a new one, I have to give my Dad credit for this, he passed them out to all our family and friends when I was born. Thanks Dad!

The exotic smells of Hawaii's tropical flowers have yet to be captured authentically in a bottle - until now. 

Katherine Growney grew up on the Big Island of Hawaii and began her career as a fashion writer working in New York City for such magazines as Elle, Lucky and Harper's Bazaar. When she noticed the lack of authentically beautiful scents being created from Hawaii's flowers she embarked on a journey to create a line of luxury perfumes from the delicate florals of her childhood. 

Saffron James Parfums has three enchanting scents; le'a, 'ume and punono. You will be sure to find one that suits your inner wahine.

Thanks to the lovely ladies over at Love Notes for the introduction.

Amuse Soup...

An amazing amuse bouche from a favorite Hawaii food blog; ma'ona.

Tomato Basil "Soup" in Parmesan Cups

Serves 6 as a very light starter course

Special equipment: an ice cream maker

1 lb. tomatoes

5-6 basil leaves

1/2 c. water

1/3 c. sugar

1/2 t. salt

1/4. t. pepper

dash cayenne

juice from one lime

approximately 1 1/2 c. freshly grated Parmesan cheese

basil leaves for garnish

Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil and drop in the tomatoes for 20-30 seconds until the skins begin to split. Remove tomatoes from the pot and rinse under cold water until cool enough to peel. Peel and core. Remove seeds and coarsely chop. Puree chopped tomatoes and basil leaves with 1/2 cup water in a blender until smooth.

Pour pureed tomato mixture into a small pot, adding sugar, salt, pepper and cayenne. Simmer for five minutes over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Remove pot from heat and allow to cool to room temperature. Stir in lime juice, then strain the entire mixture through the finest sieve or chinois available. Freeze according to ice cream maker instructions.

While the soup is freezing, grate 1 1/2 cups fresh, moist Parmesan cheese. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and make six equidistant mounds of grated cheese. Gently press the cheese down into flat, three inch rounds. Bake in a 350 degree oven for ten minutes until golden brown. Remove from oven, let cool sixty seconds, then gently transfer each round to an empty muffin tin cup and press down to form a cup shape. They remain pliable for just a few minutes before stiffening. Allow to cool completely.

Scoop the frozen soup with a melon baller and place one scoop in each Parmesan cup. Top with basil and serve immediately.

White Cosmopolitan

2 oz. Absolut vodka

1 oz. St. Germain liqueur

1/2 oz. lime juice

1 oz. white cranberry juice

Shake the ingredients together with ice and strain into a chilled martini glass. Garnished with an orchid blossom frozen into a ball of ice. Serves 1.

Rose Royale

1 oz. Hendrick's gin

1/2 oz. rose syrup

1/2 oz. fresh lemon juice

2 oz. Champagne

1 red rose petal

Shake together the gin, rose syrup, and lemon juice. Strain into a Champagne glass and top with Champagne. Garnish with a rose petal. Serves 1.

Gorgeous drinks from the amazing Daniel Boulud via Elle Decor. 

Everyone Wants To Be The DJ

Flavortunes is a fantastic way to jazz up your next party and get your guests involved before they even set foot in the door. Send your guests a free personalized online invitation to your party where they can preview and choose the songs that they would like to have played at your event. Keep track of who is attending and the party playlist your guests create online. When everyone has added their picks, you simply rank the songs and download the playlist onto your computer. 

It is a fun twist on the traditional online invitation and may even prevent your guests from fighting over the iPod controls all night!

Black & White...with a splash of color.

A pop of color is all you need to dress up a table. We did this simple place setting by starting with a black tablecloth, a plain, white dinner plate and a beautiful salad plate with platinum detailing. On the top of the plate we set a matching coffee cup and saucer and in the cup we placed a single, red rose. Simple and striking.

Lovely Lanterns

A great alternative to the standard paper lantern would be these beautifully patterned lanterns from Ideal Favors. I love the bright colors and many choices of patterns they have, check them out HERE.

Tropical White

We are guest blogging again at Create My Event. Today we have created an all-white formal dinner party. Check out the blog for all of the details.

Hawaii: A Sense of Place

This is one of my favorite books on homes in Hawaii, it really captures the true style of tropical living from interior designer Mary Philpotts McGrath.

Hawaii: A Sense of Place, is a rare look into real Hawaii homes where home decor is primarily influenced by nature and culture. This book expresses in beautiful detail the unique and varied style of living that we enjoy here in the islands.

Origami Inspired

We did a table awhile back that was inspired by beautiful Japanese origami paper and I wanted to share some photos of it with you because it is still one of my favorites. We decorated the table with origami paper to mimic the pattern of a tablecloth and instead of a traditional table runner we used a long role of the paper to give the table lots of color - this is a great tip and inexpensive to boot! We also used the origami paper around the chopsticks, on the tops of the menus and as little paper crane place-card holders to tie everything in together.

For favors we gave our guests little "Bento Boxes" of Japanese sushi that are actually homemade soaps.

Perhaps my favorite part of the table was the menu, where we printed different animals you could create with the origami paper, on the back of the menus.

The rest of the table we kept simple with white plates, flat glassware and white cut-out votive holders. Remember; you can use just about anything you love as inspiration to create a truly beautiful table.