Frog and Goat

NY Strip Steak marinated in soy sauce, worcestershire sauce, minced onion, cumin and black pepper with a dash of lemon juice for good measure.
Salad with the same dressing as the other day.
Potato pancakes sauteed in a little butter, a little duck fat and a little olive oil. With a dollop of Daisy…I thought all sour cream was the same and then I met Daisy.
The wine is Montoya Cabernet.

Usually we eat out after my Thursday night class. This week I planned to meet with the people in my group so we could discuss the group paper due in April. Happily, the paper due date was delayed a week and so we decided to meet next Tuesday afternoon instead.

I called the better-half when I got in my car and told him pizza was a go. I offered to pick it up on my way home from a third-tier pizza place (still locally owned but not one of our top choices) but he declined and he headed out to get pizza from a top-tier pizza joint.

We ate the whole thing. Pizza bliss.

Tuna with pepper, shrimp, rice and spinach with garlic:

I make the cocktail sauce for the shrimp and refuse to measure. I use Heinz ketchup (it’s more democratic), horseradish, Frank’s hot sauce, lime juice (usually I use lemon juice, but I was feeling crazy) and plenty of shakes of Old Bay.

The spinach dish is garlic sauteed in olive oil and, because we had it, duck fat and then I added the spinach and some soy sauce.

The wine was Bonny Doon Pacific Rim Riesling…one of our favorites. The bottle and the wine that comes in it are beautiful.

Here’s Tuesday’s entry:

We made the tomato sauce with a can of tomato puree, chopped mushrooms, shallot, garlic, celery and sugar and spice and everything nice. The cheese is sliced fresh mozzarella. We used Barilla penne.

The salad dressing is the French dressing from The Joy of Cooking, page 360 of the 1975 edition. Easy and delicious.

The little bowl of olive oil is Canestro Extra Virgin Olive Oil infused with garlic and chili pepper straight from Italy via a co-worker’s suitcase. Very olivey and spicy. A perfect gift for us and it went well with the French baguette.

The wine was Rhone and it was an excellent motivator for me to quit dragging my feet and finish writing my paper that is due on Thursday. Talk about being apathetic. Anything, and I mean absolutely anything, was a welcomed distraction from working on that paper.

Correction (3/29):
Jeez, I forgot to mention the sauce had sauteed italian sausage from here.

I’ve been thinking about doing this for some time now and so this week may be the lamest week ever here on the F&G, but I’m going to take a picture of what we eat for dinner and post it. If nothing else, I’ll be able to look back in a few years and say, “this is what started the clogged arteries.”

Grilled chicken (lemon juice, white wine, oregano, garlic and onion powder, salt and pepper and olive oil)
Rice-A-Roni (the San Francisco treat) rice pilaf (made with chicken broth and chives added to the mix)
Steamed broccoli

A glass of water for me and a Shiner Bock for the better-half.

We had some of our land cleared last week. We’re going to plant some fruit trees and a garden in the side yard, build a pool in the side/back yard and eventually an out building (on the other side of the house) that will house the better-half’s wood-working shop and his business. We have a lot of work ahead of us.

This is what our side yard looked like this time last week:

Here’s an action shot from our incomplete screened porch (sorry about the posts consuming so much of this photo):

This is what our side yard looks like now:

Last night the better-half and I went to Bacchus for dinner. We’ve been there once before and were very impressed so we decided to eat our celebratory dinner there last night. The menu at the link above is slightly different than the one we looked at last night, but the linked menu will give you a good idea of what’s served. We started with drinks, because that’s what we do.

I had a Kir Royal because I love both chambord and champagne. The better-half stuck with his favorite mix of Maker’s Mark and ginger ale. We had the sautéed calamari and beef carpaccio to start. Garlicky and caper-laden goodness. The better-half got the spinach caesar and I had the fried goat cheese salad. The pecans were outstanding. Salty and sweet.

He had the veal marsala and I had the baked lobster. Know how lobster can be a tricky beast? Look away for one second and it becomes tough and dried out? The chef created a perfect lobster tail with (and I’m guessing, because the menu doesn’t say) olive oil, tarragon and lemon juice. I poked around in the shell to get every last bit. The veal marsala was tasty too.

We were too stuffed to eat dessert but we’ve had dessert there before. I think in the future we’ll skip the salads since they were huge and got in the way of dessert.

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This morning the alarm clock jolted me awake. I hit the clock so hard that once again I advanced the time by an hour. I was so discombobulated that I really thought it was 7am when I woke up. I’m supposed to be at my desk by 7:30. Lucky for me I figured out the correct time. On my way into work, I drove by the usual place to stop and buy coffee and it was slammed. I decided I didn’t need coffee. After about 30 minutes at work, I walked down the street to a new place that went in where the sexy Italian men used to serve up a nice cup of caffè. The bright, shiny college students working there got a dollar tip on a $2 coffee because I figured it’s Friday and they need beer money. The coffee was delicious and now I feel like I can avoid snoring at my desk.

Ten years ago, the better-half and I got married. Next time, we elope.

Two weeks ago I was wearing shorts. Two weeks ago it was Winter. This morning there’s snow on the ground. This morning it’s Spring. Weather in Virginia is like that. That snow is sure to be gone double-quick since the forecast is for 54.

This, my friends, is some good cheese. Naturally, if we get to choose, we choose Goat.