Sunday Dinner

A quiet day, highlighted by biscuits in the morning (10 minutes from scratch into the oven today), doom-watching the Sunday morning political shows, and then preparing my contribution to this month’s Supper Club.  I was asked to bring green beans and a bottle of wine.

The wine raised an interesting question: what goes with Polish food?  The Internet machine spat out the answer: a crisp Reisling to cut through the heaviness of Eastern European cuisine.  HEB had a nice one for 22 dollars and the advice turned out to be good - the acidity did not let the food muddy the flavor, and it was a refreshing compliment on an early spring evening in Houston.

The green beans were also successful.  I used an Ina Garten recipe for green beans with gremolata (a sprightly mixture of pine nuts, minced garlic, fresh parsley, grated Parmesan cheese and lemon zest).  My new favorite technique is blanching raw vegetables - two or three minutes in boiling water to set the bright color and soften the veg, then a dunk into ice water to stop the cooking.  It makes green beans so much easier to cook.  Then a quick sauté in olive oil, a toss with the gremolata, some salt and pepper and that’s it.

My friend W was this month’s host and his wife did all the cooking. Stuffed cabbage, pierogies, kielbasa, a pork remoulade, roasted potatoes and carrots, chicken soup, green salad, and poppy seed Bundt cake.  And my green beans!  

It was four couples and lots of good conversation.  Dinner parties really are underrated.  They seem so bourgeois, but you have to get past the social conventions - the awkward greetings, the quick sizing up of each other, the conversational gambits - and recognize that it’s just having dinner with good friends.  I think old age lets you get past all that.  Who am I trying to impress any more?

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I am almost out of my prescribed medications a week before going on my annual golf trip.  That means I have to see my doctor this week, which means I get weighed in again.  I run a little heavy these days, so the weigh-in is no fun, but I am slowly getting over it.  I feel good, I exercise a lot, I am getting stronger every week, and again, who am I trying to impress?

I also need to get some presentation materials in tomorrow for a speech I am giving later this year at the State Bar’s Annual Meeting.  I am filling in for a friend on the topic of selling a law practice.  I am no expert on this topic, but that has never stopped me before.  Fortunately, my friend has given me her presentation materials and I actually studied this issue in the past when I was on a committee working on the ethics rules, so thirty minutes shouldn’t be a big deal.

I also need to take one of my dogs to the vet tomorrow.  She is not eating well and has a sour smell.  I hope it’s not a liver or kidney problem.  We lost a dog a few years ago for something similar and it would break my heart to lose this sweet, sweet dog too.

Wish me luck.