unexpected supper club

they descended upon me, took over my kitchen and poured me a glass of wine. it doesn't get any better. we always talk about getting together for dinner, planning a big beautiful meal, and, most often, life gets in the way of what each of us loves... preparing and enjoying food with the people we love. i could have easily flaked out because i’ve been knee-deep in work for quite some time now. but, alas, there was no time to wiggle out, and little energy left to make my usual excuses. i don't think they would have listened anyway. that’s what good friends do, they pull you (kicking and screaming) to the things you need, back to sanity, back to what you enjoy about your life... when you need it the most.

we started around 4:30, and by 6:30 we had a table full of fabulous food. central to the mouthwatering menu was this receipe for "Ultimate Beef Braciole". fyi, we decided adding the eggs wasn’t such a great idea. eeewww. so we skipped that part.
gretchen loves to cook—we all do—but her most recent request was to prepare a fantastic meal and NOT have to clean up the kitchen. and, of course, cleaning is equally a part of who i am... as much as cooking, i hate to admit. so i was happy to oblige. my kitchen took a hit, but all was good with that first bite.

great meal, thanks gretchen!


i do have to say, i did make a mean box of spaghetti to toss in her awesome sauce stuff. but then again, i’m not so sure boiling water for a specific length of time and tossing it into a colander counts as “cooking’... contrary to what my husband thinks.


oh, and then there was the popcorn crack. more on that later  :-)


all in all, it was wonderful. good friends, good food, good conversation, lots of laughing... and they put up with my kids.

here’s a snippet of the fabulous eats:
as you can see, D is loving her food, while Scott is manhandling it... ha!