I'm back!! It has been crazy here with work, parties, family and trip planning. Since it has been way too long since I have posted I will get right too it. We had a wonderful, busy November. I made lots of good food, The Chef was home (YAY!!) for Thanksgiving and cooked an incredible dinner for his girls and we drank lots of good wine. I will start with the food....
I have been obsessed with brioche lately. So, so yummy! A bread you don't even need to butter because it takes so much butter in the dough?!? I'm in LOVE!! I made brioche and decided to make one loaf of bread and take the rest of the dough and make sticky buns. They were tasty!
After the sticky buns, I figured I had already been in the kitchen all morning, I might as well make a day of it. I decided to make Lasagne alla Bolognese.
Of course I had no Ragu alla Bolognese or Bechamel sauce so The Girl and I spent an insane amount of time cooking that day. But it was so worth it when this bad boy came out of the oven....
A friend in the wine industry had accepted a new job in a new town so there was a great "going away" party for Miss J. There were lots of wines to drink (of course)
My favorites were the 2005 Piroutte Cabernet Sauvignon from Longshadows and the 2006 Sucker Punch from Giant. Of course the 2005 Chateau Mangot was very good as well!!
The Girl and I made apple butter out of Honeycrisp apples a few days later. There are so many great apples here in Washington but my all time favorite is the Honeycrisp. Just the right amount of acidity and sweetness. They also make a great apple butter!! We canned a few pints to add to our pantry of strawberry, blackberry and nectarine jams. Now we had even more reason to make brioche!! :)
Before we knew it Thanksgiving was here. The Chef is not normally home for holidays. With his job, you never know and one of the bosses needs to be there, right?!? But this year we were lucky and he had the day off. We had the traditional fare of turkey, dressing, cranberry sauce, veggies, mashed potatoes and giblet gravy. Of course our cranberry sauce is real cranberries simmered with ginger and lemongrass (totally not out of a can! Ick!!) Our dressing is also not out of a box. The Girl helped tear up the old bread.
Day old hoagie rolls, handfuls of herbs from my herb garden and homemade stock made for a very, very tasty dressing!
It was a great meal. Of course there was bubbly and wine as well but this was all about the food.
It was so nice to relax at home with The Girl and just enjoy our little family. It seems we are pulled in so many different directions, especially at this time of year, that is was incredibly nice to slow down.
Of course the quiet never lasts long and it was off to the races again to get ready for Christmas and our Europe trip. We can't complain though. We have a very wonderful life and are incredibly lucky to have what we have and be able to do what we love.
