A Finger in Every Pie

Dear Friends...

Just a place-holder to tell you that I haven't been posting because I have nothing happy to share at the moment.  My dad is in the hospital, and the only recipe I have for you is how to make a tasty and palatable milkshake out of a can of Ensure nutrient drink (secret:  big scoops of any rich ice-cream, duh).  We hope to be taking him back to his home quite soon, but it will be for his final stretch of a few months more, perhaps, on the planet. 

He's had a good long run, but as one of my dear cousins says, that doesn't compensate for the fact that none of us is getting out of here alive. 

On this day...

 

...we didn't work;
I didn't cook today, and
G didn't wash the dishes.
We slept late, and G brought me
coffee in bed.

We went out for Mexican breakfast, and had chorizo and eggs and rice and beans and
guacamole and tortillas. 

We went walking in the Conservatory Gardens,
and drenched ourselves in Spring. 
G bought me an ice-cream. 

Back at home, we curled up together
for a lazy mid-afternoon nap and fell asleep in each others' arms. 
Before I met G, I had never fallen asleep in
someone's arms,
except perhaps when I was a baby.
I always seemed to need to turn away from someone else; I needed  space to fall asleep.
But now, in his arms, I sleep like a baby again. 

I took a long lazy bath, and we went out for a simple but very good dinner.  Just us.  Today was just for us,
no others included.

We came home, and watched movies, and made popcorn.

We didn't do anything splurgy or costly.  We didn't buy any gifts.
But we had a day that felt completely and utterly luxurious. 

We paid attention to each other; we made a
conscious effort not to let the pressures and difficulties and stresses of other days distract us from each other today. 

And we kissed a lot, and smiled a lot, and touched a lot.
We thought about this past year, which has brought us both painful challenges and deep grief, the things that happen outside our private duality, outside the current of
happiness we have in each other.  And still,
it's been the best year of our lives.
We thought about the six years before this past year,
and remembered and
joked and teased and tickled.

On this day, one year ago, we were married.

This is what happens...

...when you think you have a 10" springform pan in the house, and it turns out that you only have  9" and 8 1/2" springform pans, and you decide to go ahead and bake your hopefully delicious Passover orange-almond cake (to be drenched in an eye-poppingly intense mandarin-lime syrup) in the 9" pan.  After all, what difference will one little inch make? 

A lot.  And this picture was taken when it had already collapsed a bit.  At its height, it was a good three inches above the pan.  Fortunately it contained itself and the batter didn't run, and this cake is even now sitting in its bath of tangy citrus syrup, waiting for tonight's verdict. It did get this weird effect when it collapsed even more, as tortes are supposed to do -- the weirdness being that it developed a sort of a tight little waistline, like a pouffy dowager trying to cinch a belt in as far as it will go.  Recipe (I added quite a bit of lime juice to the syrup, and some Boyajian orange oil as well) here. 

In any case, I'll decorate it with a bunch of citrus slices, and we'll see how it goes down... 

...along with its companion, the Queen of Sheba, an aptly-named cake for the Passover table.  I've made many a flourless or semi-flourless chocolate cake, but when I tasted this cake at Danielle's house a year or so ago, I knew I had to make it.  It sat as an idea in my mind, waiting patiently for an occasion -- until now.  I did substitute Passover cake meal for the flour, which can sometimes be a dangerous thing.  This happened to me a couple of years ago when I tried to make a tart crust for Thomas Keller's Lemon Sabayon Tart, using pine nuts and matzoh meal.  Lemon sabayon filling?  Great.  Crust?  Not so much. 

But when it's a matter of a couple of tablespoons, and most of the flour is nut meal anyway (I used ground hazelnuts instead of ground almonds), and there's a lot of good chocolate in it, which really hides a multitude of sins -- well, the Queen of Sheba should reign resplendent at the seder table tonight.  Of course, the ganache broke slightly, which accounts for the swirling techtonic effect on top.  But I kind of liked it, so I decided not to have a fit and just get on with things. 

After several hours of hearing about the bread of affliction and eating a fair amount of matzoh, cake is always going to be a welcome diversion, even with a few imperfections.  I was also hoping to make the much-lauded chocolate-covered caramelized matzoh crunch this year, but it simply wasn't destined to happen, since I was glazing cakes until rather late, which resulted in us having dinner at 10:30 last night.   

I will say that I have high hopes for both cakes, the Tamasin Day-Lewis recipe, slightly adapted by me, and the Alice Medrich/Habeas Brûlée version of the Queen of Sheba.  Happy Passover.

Update, 4/20/08:  Both cakes were more than well worth making, and a big success with the Seder crowd.  Orange-Almond cake was delightfully crunchy with a startlingly delicious citrus zing from all that soaking syrup.  And the Queen of Sheba was sheer heaven.  So much so that when the final episode of John Adams was about to start tonight and I realized that I didn't have any freshly whipped cream to go with the remainder of the chocolate cake to enhance my viewing pleasure, I tried to make whipped cream in the bedroom so I could watch TV while getting dessert ready (okay, restrain yourselves here).  Yes, there were only slightly disastrous side effects before G and I were enjoyably transported back to the 19th century accompanied by plates of chocolate cake and whipped cream. 

Digging the Dirt: I'm not referring to sustainable farming

Usually when I think and occasionally write about politics and food, or the politics of food, it's about things like access and equity and choices and sustainability and other nice Kingsolvery, Gore-ish, Waters-ly, Pollan-esque type stuff. 

But maybe I'm feeling a little mean today, because this story was so juicy, so delicious, that I couldn't quite keep it to myself.  So read amongst yourselves, and decide whether or not John McCain's wife has actually ever tied on a frilly posied apron in order to start wielding her spatula.

Done?  Okay.  Now, I was originally going to link to "Cindy's Recipes" directly on McCain's site, which also bore the proud banner of "McCain Family Recipes" (I don't know about your family, but my grandma was most assuredly not busy whipping up Ahi Tuna with Napa Cabbage Slaw or Passion Fruit Mousse).  But this very morning, as I was about to start creating the links, the pages began to disappear from the McCain website in front of my very eyes.  Some busy little person who lifted those recipes in Cindy's name is desperately trying to save their job -- unless, of course, they're already history, and the task of erasing this embarrassment has been undertaken by a new fetchit. 

But at least you have the pretty side-by-side recipe comparisons in the Huffington Post article to keep you entertained while you decide how to cast your vote come November, you foodie, you. 

Upper East Eating

Like most of New York, I'm pretty much always on the look-out for a place to meet with a couple of chums where we can slug back some good wine and eat something delicious and not break the bank.  Not an easy ticket to fill these days. 

So when the charming Bunni suggested that Bakerina and I go with her to try the newly re-opened Panorama (an italianate resto that had moved from the corner of Second Avenue and East 85th St. to a few doors down, into the middle of the block on 85th between 1st and 2nd aves), I was game.  I'm always game for a night out with the girls, despite the grumbles it inspires from G, who doesn't take kindly to having his comfort object (read:  person who makes dinner) taken out of his immediate radius. 

I vaguely remembered the old Panorama.  It was fine, but as far as I could recall, there wasn't a lot to set it off from the rest of the pack of Upper East hangouts that run down Second Avenue from 86th St. down to the mid-Seventies, usually filled with preppyish types who are as scornful of me as I of them, I'm quite sure.  It had whatever bevvies are required by that sort of joint, and a fairly standard menu of Italianish food. 

But the new Panorama is something else altogether.  This isn't a place where overgrown Upper East boys and their molls come to drink and force others to sigh over the noxious behavior of the overprivileged.  This is a place with a great little wine list, delicious standard dishes and creative specials, and very considerate service -- all at excellent prices. 

To start with, our wines were lovely.  I chose a Viognier that was described as have lychee and apricot notes, and it did not disappoint, not at all.  Scented and fruit-forward, but still crisp, it was the perfect wine for a spring evening.  B and B were also fond of their reds (Bakerina's was a Pinot Noir; Bunni's was something I haven't heard of; both were quite good). 

On reading the menu, I received the happy and unusual surprise of a pricing scale that seemed more than fair.  This was certainly a place that, if the food didn't disappoint, would merit more visits.  And no, it did not disappoint.

We shared good appetizers of shrimp in garlic sauce, crispy calamari and a refreshingly creative salad with beautiful greens, citrus, and almonds in a strawberry vinaigrette.  Then we went on to pastas.   Bunni and Bakerina each had one of the specials, Bunni's a good paglia y fieno (green and white homemade pasta in a creamy sauce with ham and peas) and Bakerina's a nice mound of spaghetti in a slow-cooked, meaty ragu.  I made a special request -- I wanted the lobster ravioli from the menu of specials, but I wanted it in the light cardinale sauce described on another dish -- white wine, garlic, cherry tomatoes, asparagus and shrimp.  The kitchen had no trouble accomodating this request, something else that's very nice and not always easy to find. 

In a word -- delicious.  All was perfectly cooked, and my entree in particular was light and lovely, just what I wanted.  No room left for dessert, but that was fine too.  So -- should you find yourself on the Upper East for one reason or another, say after a day of museuming on Museum Mile or parking yourself in the park, give a thought to Panorama. 

Fingers in Other Pies: Testing Mania

I've been toying with the idea of using this blog to write about subjects other than food for a while now.  I thought about starting another blog, and realized that that probably wouldn't work, since I have quite enough trouble updating one blog on any sort of regular basis. 

Some time ago, I had the good fortune to meet Meg Hourihan of Megnut, who in the short but compelling history of blogging is considered one of the "early" bloggers -- and in fact, is one of the folks who started Blogger (now owned by Google, of course).  At the time I met her, she had just changed her blog and her blogging life in a way that intrigued me.  She had been writing a sort of "everything" blog, and she made a decision to change it to a food blog.  "That's funny," I thought.  "Here I am, writing a food blog, and I kind of wish I had a little more room to write about other things and not feel obligated to tie them back in to food all the time.  I'd like to do the opposite of what Meg's just done." 

It wasn't only Meg.  You all know what great admiration I have for my blogging chums Bakerina and Bunni.  Bakerina writes a blog that has to do with food a fair amount of the time, but also devotes a good bit of space to world issues, knitting and existential angst.  And Bunni writes a kind of "stranger than fiction" blog of the tales of her life and her general take on the human condition (the prognosis is not good, folks) -- but every so often she posts something about food, including her recipe for a minestrone that could break hearts and win awards. 

And then there's my latest favorite read:  If I Ran The Zoo.  Another mixed-bag blog; no recipes here that I've seen, although I do claim personal acquaintance with one of the multiple posters (whom I happen to know has been an extremely accomplished cook since childhood, or maybe before).  She prefers, however, to share her acerbic take on politics and the politicos who make them, as well as an occasional and necessary quotidian skewering of her close encounters with local nimrods.  Another of her colleagues often posts his rather glorious photos of places I'd like to be right about now, so there's generally a fair amount of eye-candy as well as mind-protein there.  Group blogs (even those organized around a controlling idea) have, by their nature of course, multiple personalities -- but in a good way.

I know it's not unusual to have a polymorphous sort of blog. Lots of people do.  The trick is in having one that people actually want to read -- something where you might on occasion tell about your kid's antics or your lunch date or your latest, greatest recipe, and which also manages to tie those things back into some kind of unsolved mystery or universal truth or quest for fire.  So here lies a declaration of intent. I'm not going to stop writing about food, but I'm not always going to write about food.  I'm going to take the liberty of sometimes  writing about other things, and we'll see how that goes.  I know I've done that before on a few occasions, but now I'm making it formal.

At the moment I don't have much time for a comprehensive post, due to midterms.  One of the requirements of sabbatical year is that I'm obliged to spend some time sitting "on the other side of the desk."  Being a student for a change can actually be quite relaxing compared to teaching -- except during exam time. However, it helps me remember why I'm such an advocate for the abolition of standardized testing (and tests in general as a measure of what has been "learned.")  Even though the tests I take in graduate courses are not "standardized", they follow enough of a rote format to make me question their value. 

It's not that I'm a "bad test taker" -- just the opposite, actually.  Unlike many of my own students, I'm good enough at memorizing information for a test that I can immediately forget once the test is over.  But I see it for what it is -- a thoroughly ridiculous exercise.  And don't tell me that that's the way the world works, everyone has to take tests, and so that's the way it's got to be, world without end, amen. 

The pressure and urgency felt by the education community from the massive onslaught of standardized tests produced by the Bush administration's No Child Left Behind policy has been touted as responsible for "making gains" in education -- which gains are, of course, measured by standardized test scores.  Does no-one hear this as a tautology?  NCLB has, at best, caused certain communities to score better on standardized tests -- since that's all their schools teach anymore:  test sophistication skills, test-taking, test prep, material that will be on the test.  Those who actually stand to benefit from this policy?  The companies that manufacture standardized tests and test-preparation curricula.

Is there a contradiction in the words "test preparation curricula," or is it just me?   Schools are now in the business of implementing curricula that are centered around passing tests.  The test is no longer an instrument to gauge whether or not the student has learned the curriculum.  The curriculum is an instrument geared to help the student pass the test.  What is important is the test itself -- not the learning.  Indeed, no-one seems to even bother to ask why we're teaching what we're teaching, and if anyone actually wants or needs to learn it.

And if for some strange reason anyone were to decide that they actually want to measure learning, well, surprise, there are other ways besides tests to do it.  I'm not going to give a tutorial here (and no, there won't be a test on this), but just google "performance-based assessment" or "alternative assessment" or something along those lines.

I know this is not what you come here for.  Just indulge me for a while.  Maybe if I write about this in a place where people are used to reading about food, I'll reach a different audience.  Then again, if you came here for a recipe, this is probably just going to piss you off.  And you can feel free to tell me that.  Comments are open.

But for the moment, I won't try to tie this in to some favorite recipe for cookies to help students feel less anxiety on testing day.  I'll soon get back to some regularly-scheduled food-related programming as well, but an occasional meandering into other subject areas is also on the AFIEP agenda. 

Pi Day, My Way: The Whole Story

I gave you just the teaser in the last post, but here's the whole story of this galette, or rustic tart.  And I must say, while a large wedge of two-crust apple pie probably reigns supreme in G's heart, I like this a lot.  And yeah, so does he, judging from the second not-so-dainty slice which he cut for himself.

Pi day stole upon me, and I knew I didn't have time to think of, plan for, shop for, and bake a full-scale pie.  But I had apples in the fridge.  I just needed to create something a bit different from our favorite, already-blogged apple pie. 

Galette, I thought, rustic tart.  I could whip that up pretty fast.  After a quick perusal of that favorite cookbook known as the internets, I took a bit from here and a bit from there, and came up with a few secret weapons to set this galette apart.  The first was apricot jam, but not just any old apricot jam.  This was a jar of preserves bestowed upon me as a set of three (also including raspberry and blueberry-lime, both of which I have been seen eating straight from the jar with a spoon -- and I don't even like jam all that much, except for this jam and June Taylor's jam).  They were serendipitous birthday gifts from a cousin lucky enough to live in Cambridge, where she has breakfast at the Hi-Rise Bread Company every day.  These preserves are so good that either Hi-Rise is going to have to start selling them online, or I might have to move to Cambridge.  I was saving the apricot, doing my delayed gratification routine, since apricot is one of my preferred flavors of anything.  But what better sacrifice than to use a few tablespoons to waterproof a crust and flavor a filling in honor of pi day? 

Secret weapon number two is an old baker's trick -- using crumbled amaretti cookies to soak up fruit juices between the crust and the fruit. Fortunately I had some of my favorite pretty amaretti to crush into rubble and sprinkle atop the jam, under the apples.  And their toasted almond flavor would be perfect with the apples and the apricot.   

My favorite pie crust recipe, a bunch of apples, a shot of Calvados, and we were in business.  The lovely thing about a galette is that it's actually about half as much work as a pie -- only one crust to roll, less filling to peel and core and cut and season, and a rough, devil-may-care shaping.  None of your (or Martha's) cut-out leaves and hearts here.

The proof, however, as they say, is in the tasting.

"This might be the best crust yet," I said. 

"Mmmmff, I mfdunnommffff," said G, from around another large mouthful of galette.  He swallowed, and continued.  "The crust on the one you made at Thanksgiving was pretty great." 

"Well, that was a pie, and this is a galette or rustic tart."

"Yeah, well, maybe it's that the two-crust pie has more crust." 

"And it has more apples, too.  I use twice as many apples for the pie, and twice as much crust."

G seemed to experience a sudden "aha!" moment through his next mouthful.  "Now it all makes sense," he said.  "This is diet pie.  It only has half as much of everything."  Clearly this was ample justification for the second slice, as he got up and ambled toward the kitchen. 

Pi Day Apple Galette

Pi Crust

1 1/2 cups flour

1 Tbsp. sugar

1/2 tsp. salt

8 Tbsp. unsalted butter

2 Tbsp. Spectrum shortening (w/o trans-fats)

2 Tbsp. vodka with 1 Tbsp. water and 3 ice cubes

Process flour, salt, and sugar in food processor until combined, about 2 one-second pulses. Add butter and shortening and process until cornmealy, and there are still some small, pea-sized pieces of butter and shortening.  Empty mixture into medium bowl.

Sprinkle vodka and water over mixture. With rubber spatula or your hand, use folding motion to mix, pressing dough until it just clumps together. Flatten dough into a 4-inch disk. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 45 minutes or up to 2 days.

Pi Apples

5 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, sliced into 1/8 inch pieces

1 tsp. grated lemon zest

3 Tbsp. sugar

1 Tbsp. Calvados

1 tsp. cornstarch

4 Tbsp. apricot jam/preserves

3 pairs of hard amaretti cookies, crushed into rubble

2 Tbsp. butter

Cream and crystal sugar for sprinkling

Preheat the oven to 350F.  Toss apples with zest, sugar and Calvados.  Roll out pie crust into a 15 or 16" circle on a piece of parchment.  Slide the parchment with the rolled-out crust onto a rimless baking sheet. Spread apricot jam in a circle in the center, leaving a one and a half to two-inch border for folding up over the apples.  Sprinkle with crushed amaretti, making a nice thick bed over the jam.  Arrange the apples over this in concentric circles.  Add the cornstarch to the liquid left in the apple bowl, and stir until dissolved.  Drizzle this over the apples until it disappears.  Dot the apples with bits of butter. Then fold and pleat the crust up to make a nice rim around the apples. Brush the crust with cream, and sprinkle the whole with crystal sugar.

Bake the tart for 30 minutes in the bottom third of the oven.  Rotate the tart, and bake for another 30 minutes in the top third of the oven, until the pastry is golden brown, the apple juices are bubbling nicely, and the apples yield tenderly to a knife point. Cool for a little while at least -- but eat while still warm. 

Pi Day, My Way

Consider this a mere placeholder.  Suffice it to say that I did bake this apple galette today in honor of pi day, which is being hosted by both the fabulous Alanna of Kitchen Parade and A Veggie Venture and  the delightful Krysta of EvilChefMom. 

We haven't eaten it yet, but I'll come back and fill in this post with some details, and hopefully a recipe.

ADOURation Society: Revelry Continued

 
Is there ever really such a thing as *enough* when it comes to celebrating your birthday?  I think not.  And apparently our dear friends B & B, who have often figured in these pages, agree with this dictum.  Months ago, darling B asked what we were going to do for my birthday.  "Oh, G will take me out to dinner."  And he did.  "And maybe I'll have a party this year," I said, and I did. 

"But let's do something else too, just the four of us," said dearest B.  "I think the new Ducasse restaurant would fit the occasion."  Who am I to argue with such suasion?

That's how we came to be at Adour last night.  Alain Ducasse's latest project is a stunner indeed.  Ruth Reichl has described the room far better than I, and I really hope she and the rest of the staff at Gourmet will forgive me for *borrowing* the images above from their website (does attribution make a difference?)  I'm still phobic about photographing food in posh restaurants.  I know this makes me a bad blogger, but it just really interrupts my dining experience.  I have this preference for allowing myself to be overtaken by the lush environment and the lovely dinner, rather than documenting it.   

The word that best described our experience at Adour is "balance," I think.  Perhaps harmony, but I'll start with balance.  Everything was beautifully balanced, from the perfect touch of sea salt in the olive butter that accompanied the very, very good breads, to the service -- which was comfortable, with just the right touch of put-us-at-our-ease familiarity.  There was a light lacing of humor, but nary a moment's sense of intrusion.  Everyone who came to our table was smoothly delighted to serve our any and every whim -- and not for a moment obsequious.  It was as if we were all, served and servers, just having a very, very good time.  Which we were.  Well.  At least we the served were, since I can't really speak for the servers.  But it's fair to say that if they weren't, they put on a very good show.

Personally, there wasn't a mouthful I met at Adour that I didn't like -- and in most cases, love.  From my bouche's amusement at a tiny vol-au-vent filled with molten truffled cheese (quite perfect with a flute of Dom Perignon) to the petits fours pictured below, it was an evening of simple bliss. 

The stand-out was my starter.  Imagine tiny round ravioli in a herbacious, truffle-laden broth.  As you bite into each one, the rich filling of foie gras melts and fills you with happiness and well-being -- as do the slices of black truffle shaved generously over the top of the dish.  G's starter of tiny buttery clouds of ricotta gnocchi were clearly at the very pinnacle of their game -- whatever gnocchi's game is.  The normally laconic fellow that is my husband was moved to exclaim their deliciousness, especially with their partnering greens and crisped prosciutto. These were the only starters we tasted, since we're not food critics and therefore not obliged to all order different dishes.  The breakdown was that the women ordered the foie gras ravioli, and the men had the gnocchi.  I don't know what this says about gender, and I don't really need to know, since the one true thing was that it was all quite transcendent. 

Next up, staying gender-true, B and I both had Adour's luxurious version of Lobster Thermidor -- beautifully tender small lobster tails and claw meat in a classic sauce, flavored with cognac and tarragon.  The dish was accompanied by swiss chard, geometric domino slices of delicious albeit indeciferable vegetables, and a gorgeously crusted patty of lobster and mushrooms, baked in a little shell.  The men were meat-eaters -- B had a rack of lamb with piquillo peppers and apricots, and a quinoa risotto, while G had venison accompanied by jewel-like carved blocks of root vegetables.  With the agile help of the sommelier, G found us an excellent red that paired well with everyone's food.

Again, everything was in balance.  There was precisely the right amount of sauce in everyone's dish, never overshadowing the main ingredients, but simply enhancing them.  And everything was luxurious, but nothing was overly rich.

Except maybe dessert, which was a glittering event in its own right. First we had a little intermediary cheese course chosen by our most helpful and gentlemanly server, with accompaniments of red pepper jelly, acacia honeyed raisins, date paste and walnut-raisin paste.  Then the stars came out, in the form of huge desserts.  My chocolate sorbet, under a crust of unbelievably good dark chocolate, was graced with a large feuille of gold-leaf, drenched in a dark chocolate sauce and peppered with espresso flavored brioche buttons.  It was one of the deepest, darkest, most delicious chocolate experiences I've ever had -- and I've had a few.  G's apple soufflé was both gloriously pouffy and seriously apple-y -- and accompanied by a vanilla ice-cream with such an addictive vanilla perfume that the table began referring to it as vanilla crack.  B's pear clafoutis (which was actually more of a pear napoleon) was everything pear -- pear pastry with balls of pear, pear ice cream, and julienne salad of pear. 

I'm always a little sad when the petits fours appear.  I just never have the capacity for them, and I do love sweets so very much.  Which is why the servers kindly packed up a whole box of lovely macarons (filled with concentrated raspberry gelée and dark gianduja, respectively) and some chocolates for me to take home, so that I could photograph them for you on my much less lovely petits four dishes in the comfort of Chez AFIEP.   

So ends another installment of the feast of love that has been my latest birthday.  And according to some forecasts, even though February has waned, the celebrations have not, yet.  Imagine. 

Revelry Unlimited

Have you ever had an evening where you really, really needed (and you're going to have to excuse me the cliché) to feel the love - and you actually got what you needed?

That's what my umptieth birthday party was like on Saturday night.  It was the sort of evening where you wrap yourself in a delicious warmth, a sense of being surrounded by dear family who are also true friends, and true friends (some of whom you've known, as you might say, "since before we were born") who feel like -- and really are, in the best sense -- family. 

Pics are lacking at the moment, since I didn't bring a camera, and those that others took are still forthcoming.  Above is a plate that blurrily shows some of the spoils that my darling cousin Diane (in whose home we were) and I were left fighting over at the end of the evening.  Among the five(!) desserts, the only reason the fabulous Trianon cake and the stupendous chocolate gingerbread were left is because the makers (equally fabulous Bakerina and completely stupendous Bunni) made two each of those.  So alas, there's no chocolate raspberry cake or pistachio nougat cream cake or Lemon Hoo-Ha! (and yes, Lemon Hoo-Ha!  Therein lies a tale and a recipe for another time) left to show you.

Nor are there yet picture/samples of Julia Child's paté with fig jam or Amanda Hesser's lamb pitas or devilled eggs with smoked paprika or Thai-style shrimp fritters, or my own Tunisian-Russian eggplant salad or Asian blood-orange chicken wings, or rosemary-lemon-white bean spread or Maryland crab dip or marinated chevre or a platter of other cheeses (served with a June Taylor plum paste hoarded for just such an occasion)...

...because, well, not all of it, but almost all of it got eaten up.

While I was cooking and prepping all of this, I felt somewhat despondent, thinking that I'd waaay overdone it with the food, and that we would all be swamped with too many leftovers.  Not so.  The crowd of musicians and visual artists, helping professionals, theater folks, educators, science/medicine professionals, lawyers, non-profiteers, and writers descended like locusts. Fortified by Scott Peacock's champagne punch as well as lots of our favorite red and some of our favorite white that we'd laid in, they demolished the platters.

The theme was clearly *eclectic mix* both in the food and the folks.  My darling husband provided a fab music mix, and everyone ate, drank, talked, mingled, laughed uproariously, found six or many less degrees of separation (some quite amazing connections, actually), made new friends, and stayed late.

We finally left in the exuberant state of happy exhaustion that comes of a successful party, and the knowledge that whatever else life may bring, uh-huh, the love is there, whenever you have a chance to put it all together.