Busy weekend

So this weekend came and went with much fervor. Yesterday, I spent much of the day enjoying the company of a neighbor's wonderful little dog Max, as she was away for a day trip up to the Big Apple. Max is one of those wonderful dogs that spoil you if you're wondering what it takes to care for a pet. He's well-behaved, for the most part pretty calm (even though he does have some Jack Russell in him), and he has a full assortment of expressions to be able to communicate with you. He kept me company while I prepared some food for a dinner with friends yesterday evening - I cooked up a vegetable and meatball soup as a starter, along with baking a coconut cake for dessert. While all the cooking was going on, he was completely mezmerized by the squirrels and birds hanging out on our deck, enjoying the nuts and seeds I had left out, mostly for the birds, and true to his Jack roots, bounced up and down like a basketball whenever he saw a squirrel scurry about the deck. What great huggable company, and we also enjoyed a couple of good afternoon walks around the neighborhood.


Vegetable and Meatball Soup
So basic, really easy. Diced up onions, carrots, celery, turnip, and beet. I also used a sprig of sage in the soup. Got my pot good and hot, and sliced in about a tablespoon of butter. I sauteed the onions until translucent, and then I added the carrots and celery. Mixed those up a bit, just to sweat a bit, and then added the turnip and the sage. To this mixture, I added one box of organic chicken broth, and let it simmer about 2 hours (it can be much shorter, but I just let it cook while I got the cake started up and made the meatballs). At the very end, I added the beets and meatballs, and brought the soup to a boil, just to cook the meatballs through. Then that was it - I removed the sage, and the soup was ready for serving.


Coconut Cake
I pulled a recipe from epicurious.com for the coconut cake - a dense cake, and when I baked in a 12" springform pan, it finished in 50 minutes. I also used a 7 minute frosting, a la Paula Dean on foodnetwork.com (this involved emulsification of egg whites into a mixture of superfine sugar and water in a double boiler), and coated the outside with sweetened coconut. We had some last night at the party, and this morning, Hubby and I had 2 more slices left for our enjoyment. It tasted pretty good last night, but it definitely tasted better this morning.


And now we are on to this morning. We had commissioned a piece of art, about 2'x6', a while back, from local artist Kevin Kepple. He, along with his representatives at the Addion Ripley Gallery, came by this morning with the piece. Needless to say, we were very excited about the piece and regarded with much anticipation our opportunity to see the finished piece. We were not disappointed. The piece has wonderful undulating movement about it, in red, depth, texture, and we can tell that in our living room, this piece will take on different appearances over the course of even one day. Just even, as we were sitting there looking at this piece, I could see so many different aspects jump out at me, at different times of studying it. To Kevin's credit, he has so much talent; and, as he says to ours, we gave him complete free reign to develop the piece. The only criteria we gave him was that the piece was to be of a long linear form - he came up with the rest. And we are so very much looking forward to seeing this piece in its different aspects of growth for years to come.

So, we had some visitors this morning - and to prepare just a little snack for everyone, I threw together an oven pancake, a la Fine Cooking.


Oven Pancake

• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup milk (I didn't have milk this morning, so I used heavy cream)
• dash of salt

Preheat the oven to 450 - start off the preheat process with a heavy cast-iron skillet already in the oven, and lower the rack to the lowest level. I mixed all ingredietns together in the blender, whipping at highest speed to bring as much air into the mixture. Once the oven temperature reached the desired temperature, add 2 tablespoons of butter to the hot skillet, making sure to coat all sides of the pan. Pour in the batter, and bake for 14 minutes - the batter will curl up and puff up.

Serve hot with syrup, butter, honey - drizzle of choice!


So that was breakfast, and after everyone left, Hubby and I set to painting the wall where the painting will go. White walls - they may be pretty benign, but boy, they'll pick up any and every scuff mark there is. So, a new coat went on today, and our wall looks just about ready to receive its new decoration.

The rest of the day - we enjoyed a Cirque du Soleil show downtown, with a little sip of champagne, and some munchies they were passing around the tent. After the show, we joined our friends Phanie, with her husband Jimmy, and enjoyed dinner at Rosa Mexicana - just some appetizers and drinks. I enjoyed my usual CranGinger, and we ordered some Queso Fundido and flautas - Phanie and Jimmy ordered the guacamole. I have to admit - usually, their guac is salty, at least the last couple of times I've gone, but this time, it was right on, very mild and flavorful. We enjoyed good company, good eats, and it lands us to where we are now - bedtime. So it is good night to all - until the next meal!