Welcome Baby Dinner

Tonight we are going over to some friend's house to meet their new baby! Our thing is to bring over dinner whenever we go to meet the new addition to a family. It is always the same thing: Homemade Pesto (tonight I did a blend of arugula & basil), Pasta, Mixed Salad Greens, Homemade Vinaigrette, Bread, Wine, Bottle of Bubbly Water and Lemon Bars (I usually bring Barefoot Contessa Brownies (homemade), but have so many Meyer lemons that I decided to shake it up a bit).

Thursday's Dinner

As I mentioned it has been a long week so tonight we decided to take a drive down to Aldo's for dinner!

Wednesday's Dinner

It has been a long week, tonight we started with Tanqueray Tonics, which we never do especially during the week! The weather has been so gloomy, we wanted to pretend it was 90 outside and not cold & foggy! Then we moved to a nice meal of comfort food - my made up version of a french classic ~ Coq au Vin with a roasted Barley & Shallot dish. I served it with a wonderful 2005 Cotes du Rhone I found at Bi Rite Market (by the way, they have a wonderful wine collection & very reasonable).

Tuesday's Dinner

I did not feel like going to the market today so I had to get creative with what we had in the house, after a long weekend away, it was not much! I was inspired by BF's Portuguese background as well as my Basque background - both his mother and my grandmother use to use a lot of chickpeas in their houses and we have come to love them! Decided to throw in some secret seasons as well as some of the Portuguese Chorizo we won at the auction a couple weeks ago & why not some spinach I had picked up during the day - this is what we got! Enjoyed it with a wonderful glass of 2005 Blackwing Shiraz - super delicious!!! Dessert was left over frozen yogurt from last week as well as some strawberries I picked up. Enjoy!

Camping Cont ...

...... camping would not be complete without smores & .... home-made creme brulee?! The creme brulee became an added tradition last year & the recipe is from Fringale!

Memorial Day Weekend

BF & I went away for the annual camping trip with a group of friends, to Bishop, CA. This use to be a weekend of physical activities with little thought as to what we would be eating! Well, the last couple trips have become a weekend of questions, "what is for dinner tonight?" We went all out this past weekend - grilled salmon and corn one night. The next night we started with grilled portabella mushrooms and then grilled up some NY cut grass-fed beef steaks with a wild mushroom medley served with grilled asparagus. Now keep in mind all food is grilled over open fire!