“Don’t worry,” President Obama told us. "It’s not always like this." My husband and I were inside the White House, where we got to spend not more than a minute with the First Couple as we shook hands and posed for a portrait at a holiday party Tuesday night. For a second I wasn’t quite sure if Mr. Obama was talking about the economy or the gloriously decorated White House.

Turns out he was just referring to the nasty cold that froze my toes as we lined up for a reception for the media outside the southeast entrance in the biting wind. I had been to the White House for a standard tour 15 years ago, but I couldn’t remember details. And this visit? There were so many details to take in -- 19 Christmas trees, (the one my husband Anders is standing by is this year's official White House Christmas tree, a 19.5-foot Douglas Fir from Lehighton, Penn.), enormous wreathes made of dried vegetables and pinecones, garlands galore and -- my favorite -- the White House’s official Gingerbread House.

We arrived a bit early, and White House Pastry Chef Bill Yosses was checking on the white-chocolate covered gingerbread replica of the White House complete with a marizpan vegetable garden and a rendition of Bo, the First Family’s dog, made of marzipan and condensed milk.

“Every single thing is edible except the lights,” the chef told me as I was admiring the 350-pound confection. A bit of trivia: 30 pounds of honey from the White House beehive was used to make the gingerbread, and the house has cutouts depicting both the East Room and the State Dining Room. It took 4 weeks to construct!

But enough about that. On to the food!

About 300 journalists attended the reception, and so I figured we’d be served a cookie and some punch. Oh, no! This was a first-rate affair complete with wine, champagne, eggnog and various other libations such as fruit juice and even bourbon. There were elaborate buffets of heavy hors d’oeuvres in both the State Dining Room and in the East Room, serving smoked salmon, steamed shrimp, raw oysters on the half shell, and stone crab claws. Not a seafood fan? There were carving stations for turkey (and dressing) and a giant ham. There also was beef tenderloin with horseradish sauce situated on the buffet line.

As each couple entered the house, we got a ticket stamped with a time to report to the receiving line on the ground level to meet the President and Mrs. Obama and pose with them for an official portrait. (We weren’t allowed to take our own photos with the Obamas, and it’ll probably be several weeks before our copies of the pictures arrive in the mail.) Anyway, Mrs. Obama, wearing a sleeveless black party dress (that hit just above the knee), kept reminding us party-goers to eat lots of vegetables and keep moving. On that note, the menu back upstairs also featured a healthy dose of veggies -- piles of skinny roasted green beans and trays of steamed carrots and more green beans, also steamed. Oh, and salad of baby greens, complete with pomegranate seeds. The itty bitty roasted potatoes -- purple, yellow, white and red ones -- were some of the sweetest potatoes I’ve ever tasted. Wonder if they came from the White House garden?

Speaking of sweet -- I had been clued in early in the evening by someone who attended the party last year to save room for dessert. “It’s really the best part,” she insisted.

Well, I’ve been trying to avoid dessert in this gulf between holidays, BUT they were serving coconut layer cake. I’m a sucker for a good coconut cake, and I saw it being sliced and could tell at a glance that it was moist. That’s all it took -- I got the coconut cake (amazing with a hint of almond), the cherry cobbler (surprisingly tart) and a slice of Bundt-shaped gingerbread (again, very moist with a molasses glaze on top). Anders took most everything I didn’t -- so there I was sampling pumpkin pie, apple pie and lemon torte, too. And sugar cookies, beautifully decorated of course!

Holidays at the White House have a theme, and this year's is "Simple Gifts." But this gift -- to be able to roam around the White House rooms and see decorations designed by art students and towering trees grown on native farms -- and even get to sit on the furniture -- it was beyond amazing. As the Marine Band played in one room, a boy's choir from Princeton University serenaded at the entrance and a string quartet played in yet another locale, you really came away with the sense that America is still a land of abundance. Not only do we have amazing pastry chefs and talented musicians and gifted artists, we also have this Democratic institution that demands that its leader stand there for four hours straight, braving the flashbulbs and smiling a separate smile for 300 guests that he invited over for dinner. As far as I could tell, he didn't even get to eat!