Dear Food & Wine Magazine

Dear Food & Wine Magazine:  Last weekend, my husband and I entertained for the first time in over a year.  Neighbors from across the road joined us around our big hickory table to share in conversation, food, wine, and card playing.  

At this time in the season, the sun has begun its northward trek and the light streaming in the windows is different than it has been all winter.  Noticeably different.  As I pulled bread out of the oven, glanced over at the table to see what else needed to be done, and squinted my eyes to the sun's glare at the kitchen sink, I was compelled to capture these images of the evening preparation and offerings.  

We have a lovely hickory table.  It is round and about one foot too wide for card playing, but it is a beauty.  Anchored with a solid square rough hickory base, the round table has the character that makes using a table cloth impossible.  I wipe it down, checking to insure the knots have not collected any crumbs or foreign matter.  It is piece of art and should not be covered any more than is necessary.  

Fresh flowers are a constant on this table when I entertain.  The beauty of fresh flowers accentuates an evening and a meal.  Flowers become a center piece of beauty and pique the visual appetite.  Beautiful yellow lilies with pink centers filled a one gallon clear glass container, rounded with dark pink alstroemerias and accentuated with a drooping dried sunflower, dried grasses, and long snips of red rose bush stems, the latter of which were found after a stroll around our muddy snow-melting spring yard. 

My husband always pulls the night's bottles of wine out of storage before a dinner party.  He had not forgotten this tradition, wine bottles lined up next to the appetizers.  A chunk of garlicy salami.  Warm herbed brie cheese.  Crackers I had made during the week using extra sour dough starter.  Comb and buckwheat honey to sample side by side.  Dinner is often not necessary after gorging on the irresistible appetizers.  

Meanwhile in the kitchen, the hot oven, steaming from the vents, was transforming three loaves of sour dough into crispy-covered, open-crumb baguettes.  Atop the stovetop, the lasagna rested, flavors merging together.  Layers of homemade kale noodles separated sausage, ricotta cheese, and spinach, topped with halved cherry tomatoes and rounds of sliced fresh mozzarella cheese.  A final broiling of the top created poignant smells of broiled tomatoes and cheese, treats for the nose and promise of what goodness was to come. 

Thanks to our local greenhouse, plates of fresh, crunchy lettuce salad had been arranged atop a thin slice of red onion, halved cherry tomatoes, thin slices of yellow pepper, sliced cucumbers and topped with lovely leaves of fresh sorrel greens waited in holding on a shelf in the refrigerator.  A blue cheese dressing would top this crispy, fresh starter plate.  Many of my recipes are created when an ingredient is forgotten from the grocery store run.  Challenged with having no buttermilk, I winged it and threw together a winning mix of blue cheese, mayonnaise, lemon juice, and dill.  

Earlier in the day, another experiment was conducted in the creation of the meal's dessert.  A dessert ranks right next to a flower center piece for value.  A dessert should be visually beautiful as well as delicious.  Created in a Nordic ware Bundt pan, I played with a rum cake recipe, replacing the water with lime juice and grating the zest of a lime into the cake ingredients.  The cake baked and came out of the buttered bunt pan perfectly.  As it cooled, I made up the butter rum topping, pouring the butter bliss over the cake where it collected on the bottom and in the center, the ooey gooey mixture soaking into the cake's mass.  Then, I stirred up a hibiscus lime frosting to highlight the cake's beauty created by the Nordic Bundt pan.  When finished, it was difficult to decide which was more beautiful or which smelled better - the arrangement of sweet smelling lilies or the aromatic rum cake, laced with pink hibiscus frosting.  The cake won, as it could be eaten, scoring a visual and taste award!

The wine flowed, the meal was consumed, cards were dealt, stories were told, and the abundant night came to a close just before midnight.  It felt good to be together again, to see new things, to eat new food, and taste food combinations, to play together, to win to loose, to laugh and remember so many of life's real pleasures.  Pleasures shared with friends.  It is good to be back together again.  

I-Forgot-Ingredients: Blue Cheese Dressing

Big chunk of crumbled blue cheese or gorgonzola cheese

1/2 cup mayonnaise

Juice of 1/2 lime

1 teaspoon dill

Combine ingredients, adjust for desired thickness.  Dollop on top of fresh greens.