A Sugar and Spice Holiday

A Sugar and Spice Holiday (2020) - Lifetime

Reviewed by Lisa Sue

First off, a shout out to all those who have read these blogs. We do it for you dear reader, so you won’t have to suffer!  Seriously, we appreciate your support, and feel free to comment or drop us a line.  That being said, many of these movies run together after a while, but to Lifetime’s credit in this movie they stuck to convention while also shaking things up a little.  This is only the 2^nd lifetime movie I’ve watched, big shout out to Recipe for Seduction. Please please read and watch. Will Recipe for Seduction make 2020 go away? No. But I promise for 15 minutes you will at least forget about 2020. 

The first unique thing in Sugar & Spice is the heroine is Chinese American - and true to form she gets the holiday version of where are you from. No seriously, where are you from. I like her response, “Why wouldn’t she celebrate Christmas. Because she’s Jewish?” So the set up goes something like this - our heroine Suzy is a typical Type A competitor up for a big promotion at her architectural firm. She goes back home to celebrate Christmas with the family (both parents, alive!) where high school crush, slacker turned do gooder Billy ropes her into the Happy Valley Gingerlicious Bake Off (let’s stop and applaud the awesomeness of the event name.) And unlike Hallmark movies where the big event is the buildup, how about we have 3 stages of competition to this Bake Off, and seriously all 3 take center stage in the movie. This does limit the ice skating, tree shopping, and caroling but the movie makes up for it with in your face baking. Besides Suzy and Billy, there are 2 other team members on Team Hampton Meadows. Which is remarkable for several reasons - the bakery owner was the Mean Girl of high school, and bullied Suzy. Turns out Mean Girl was allergic to dairy and since she cut out dairy, she’s as nice as can be. Who knew dairy caused this? Now for all the Beckys, Karens, and Reginas out there what’s your excuse for being a Mean Girl? The final team  member is a diner owner who happens to be a classically trained pastry chef. Which begs the question, why Billy is all like Suzy is the best baker in town? Just because Suzy’s grandmother, wise dead person Nema, was the town Gingerlicious champ? Since Nema’s death, Suzy hasn’t been able to bake, it just isn’t the same. If baking is hereditary, no one is asking Ma Yung to bake, or for her cookie recipes. Suzy is baking obsessed, she has this weird way of identifying people as bakery treats. Scones, cheesecakes, her niece is a croissant. Suzy explains the food picks, which I don’t quite get, she says Pa Yung is kettle corn. What kind of baked good is kettle corn? And I was wondering why there was no pie, but eventually we get the apple pie, that is Billy. Case closed, these two are meant to be. Who doesn’t like apple pie?

Suzy reluctantly agrees to do the bake off to honor Nema, despite having to do work on her vacation to get the promotion. But if she’s doing the Bake Off, she’s all in and wants to win the contest to get money for the beloved town community center. The team even has a bake off rehearsal, with templates for the gingerbread house and everything that naturally Suzy provides. While Billy is all about making sure the Bake Off is fun, Suzy is in it to win it. From what I observed, the community center looks like it is in excellent condition, but hey, if Billy says it needs a roof who am I to disagree? First up in Round 1 is the cookie portion- bake 3 different cookies for the judges and make sure ginger is featured in one of the cookies. There is baking trash talk, “Eat my crumbs Yung!” that is good for a laugh, in case you’ve never watched Food Network. Suzy (correctly) assesses that the judges are probably old school and like their cookies traditional, so Hampton Meadows provides delicious if unoriginal gingerbread men, sugar cookies, and shortbread cookies. However, it wasn’t enough to win round 1, that went to the reigning champs the Dupont twins from Rumstick Point who created a ginger & lemon Prince Harry Cookie along with coconut macaroon snow men. Suzy the loser moves on to the second round but comes in third place which any Asian family will let you know is the 2^nd place loser. Ma and Pa Yung are supportive, which isn’t common to Asian families but needed in Christmas movies. Sweet as Pie Billy gets Suzy to karaoke Deck the Halls, to get her out of her comfort zone and make sure she’s having fun and to remind Suzy it is about the journey, and not the destination. Who picks Deck the Halls as their Karaoke Song? Go Mariah Carey’s All I want for Christmas or go home! Even if you can’t sing, scratch that. Especially if you can’t sing go Mariah. Always. To quote the movie “Find your inner Elsa, and just let it go” which applies to karaoke, baking and life in general.

So with the wise words of Nema “when life gives you crumbs, make pie crust” Suzy and company enter into Round 2, where the challenge is to make bread with ginger. Feeling adventurous, Suzy creates an elaborate pickled ginger olive rye loaf. Things are a little more harried as their 4^th baker is out with some emergency. And in the chaos and confusion, Suzy adds salt instead of sugar! But because she doesn’t taste as she is making the filling, doesn’t discover this blunder until the judges do. DISASTER! Our intrepid Hampton Meadows bakers are out of the competition! Also unlike most Hallmark movies, it would appear by now that Billy and Suzy are an item? There is kissing, dinner dates, a making bread Ghost like moment, and a break in to give Suzy the Winter Formal Dance she never got. Apparently these two while friends since high school, apparently never talked talked back in the day. Suzy thought they were only going as friends to the dance, until Billy’s ex took him back. Turns out Billy never would have taken his ex back, if Suzy hadn’t gone on and on about them only being friends. Billy invites himself to lunch, where even Ma Yung is won over because he eats stinky tofu and bitter melon. I will say he is a better person than I. Although stinky tofu (which itself is getting endangered as fewer and fewer people know how to make this delicacy) smells worse than it tastes, it is hard for me to overcome the pungent smell. And bitter melon? Well, why ruin good fish or chicken by adding in bitter melon is my stance. But I admit to having the palette of a 5 year old child, as my snacking habits attest to.

We’ve had baking drama and even work drama when young nephew unplugs Suzy’s laptop and OH NO SHE LOSES HER LATEST CHANGES TO THE DESIGN FOR WORK! Pro tip -save often and save frequently. And never, ever unplug someone else’s device. Never. With that drama sorted now we come to relationship drama and the break, much to Billy’s chagrin Suzy had gone behind his back and showed his invention to a distributor. The distributor loved the idea and wants to market the toy which should make Billy ecstatic. Instead he gives Suzy some lecture about how the invention wasn’t ready, and that he isn’t some project for her to fix. This isn’t high school, it is his life and he will live it (however poor) on his terms! A stance I admit I don’t quite get, but we press on. Having lost the competition, upset Billy, it now looks like Suzy also lost the promotion at work! What is a girl to do but cry to her dad! However, her fortunes are about to change. One team cheated, and Team Hampton Meadows is back in the Bake Off for Round 3- The Gingerbread Houses. Suzy, who totally is ok talking with Dead Grandma finally leans the secret ingredient in Nema’s baking. Guess what it is? It starts with L and rhymes with Dove. Armed with the secret ingredient, Suzy ‘s final bake off challenge is to build a gingerbread house that represents what Christmas means to you. Obviously, Christmas is about getting a man- as witnessed by literally every single movie in this blog. However, no one chose to make a Gingerbread house about that. The bake off’s loss I say. So we have in the competition Winter Wonderland. Next a gingerbread house that’s full of things that the Dupont Twins love. And then Team Hampton Meadows which builds the community center as their gingerbread house. Because what does Christmas mean to Suzy and Billy? Community. Also one can add forgiveness, because of course Billy and Suzy are ok now. And when it rains it pours, turns out Suzy DID get that promotion after all. Plot twist, the job is in Australia. And No she isn’t turning down the job. She’s worked too hard, she’s come to far to give it all up and frankly she actually likes her job. Well Billy won’t do long distance, so guess…he’ll just have to come with her across the world! No mention of the invention, we do hope he comes to his senses. Because really this is the season...for finding a man. Gingerbread THAT people.