that was the month that was
I love a lot of things about my job, but I do not like the fact that October inevitably turns into the month of CONSTANT MEETINGS. Oy. I did, at least, manage to take a long weekend in the middle of the month; I probably should have stayed home and tried to get caught up on stuff, but instead I traveled. (More about that in a separate post.)
I got home from travel and decided to invite some friends over for dinner. I cleaned the house (which should not take so long given that my house is tiny, and yet...), did some advance cooking to minimize stress on the day, and ended up serving:
» the last of the yellow peppers from my garden sliced up as an appetizer (so good);
» a French boule-style loaf of bread with tomato-olive butter;
» white bean salad with green olives, cherry tomatoes, and tarragon;
» mushroom bisque -- new recipe from the latest issue of Cook's Illustrated;
» leek & goat cheese galettes on a bed of baby greens;
» pumpkin five-spice frozen custard.
Most of the ingredients came from my garden, which is always fun. I love cooking and generally eat very well, but I seldom make things like galettes for just myself, so it's lovely to have an excuse to cook something fancy, to pull out a couple of bottles of good wine -- one vinho verde, one chardonnay -- and feed my friends and then sit around with cats in laps and get to really talk with them for the first time in what felt like months.
...and then things got so chaotic that a couple of weeks went by before I had a chance to post, go figure. But this morning I got up at 4am to finish off some lingering work responsibilities (because I needed to be done with them more than I needed the sleep), and now I think I can finally start to emerge from the work-cave I've been living in for the last four weeks.
Originally posted at Dreamwidth || Read
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I got home from travel and decided to invite some friends over for dinner. I cleaned the house (which should not take so long given that my house is tiny, and yet...), did some advance cooking to minimize stress on the day, and ended up serving:
» the last of the yellow peppers from my garden sliced up as an appetizer (so good);
» a French boule-style loaf of bread with tomato-olive butter;
» white bean salad with green olives, cherry tomatoes, and tarragon;
» mushroom bisque -- new recipe from the latest issue of Cook's Illustrated;
» leek & goat cheese galettes on a bed of baby greens;
» pumpkin five-spice frozen custard.
Most of the ingredients came from my garden, which is always fun. I love cooking and generally eat very well, but I seldom make things like galettes for just myself, so it's lovely to have an excuse to cook something fancy, to pull out a couple of bottles of good wine -- one vinho verde, one chardonnay -- and feed my friends and then sit around with cats in laps and get to really talk with them for the first time in what felt like months.
...and then things got so chaotic that a couple of weeks went by before I had a chance to post, go figure. But this morning I got up at 4am to finish off some lingering work responsibilities (because I needed to be done with them more than I needed the sleep), and now I think I can finally start to emerge from the work-cave I've been living in for the last four weeks.
Originally posted at Dreamwidth || Read
comments on Dreamwidth