Food, Food and More Food, Even Cow Food

We love the food network, the cleavage barers, the plump ones, the southerners, the northerners. Even Significant Other will sit and watch. Maybe even learn something.

We had a dinner party last night for some of my old colleagues from IT days, and spouses. We began with an antipasto to die for.I pulled out all the stops, with a trip to the Wasik's cheese shop in Wellesley, for Swiss Emmental, Parmigiano from Parma, grated to powder, Insalata Ricotta, and a couple of Italian cheese I substitued for Provlone and Fontina. Soft cheeses, with lots of flavor.The parmesan and the emmental were for the main course, more of that later.

Then I hurried to Roche brothers for fresh mozzarella, the little balls, not the big ones. Bought kalamata olives, and some mushrooms in a vinaigrette, canned artichoke hearts, a big eggplant, fresh broccoli and a red pepper. Salami, Sopressata, Mortadella, proscuitto and fresh chicken breast.Grilled the eggplant in a grill pan, everything coated with olive oil, then sprinkled it with hot pepper flakes. Broiled the red pepper, and steamed the broccoli. I hied myself into the garden for fresh basil, and made a half recipe of pesto genovese, which is the world's best pesto and takes mere minutes in a blender. Substituted almonds for pine nuts with no loss of quality. I mix some pesto into the now poached chicken breast cut into bite size pieces.

The chicken pesto used to be on the antipasto menu of a big Boston chain, Bertucci's, but they seem to have discarded it, but I figured out how to make it, so no big deal. I lined one platter with red leaf lettuce and the other with raddicchio, and arranged the antipasto on the platters. Not only was it scrumptious, it looked like a million dollars, and the effort was minimal.

Way back when I was a kid, my mom made a wonderful casserole of chicken, cheese, pasta and breadcrumbs. Even when I didn't like ANYTHING, I liked that. Found a recipe in Gourmet that served 12, that had most of the same ingredients, but updated from the 50's into more of a well, gourmet creation. Made that, and my god it was beyond belief. Not laborless, understand, but you got a long of bang for two chickens, some cheese, and a pound of imported rigatoni from Ocean State Job Lot. To die for. My mom's recipe was called Huntington Chicken.

Dessert was my mom's (what would we do without good old Mom?) lemon squares, the best ever, and made with fresh lemon juice of course. You don't use UnReal Lemon with all the off flavors and chemicals, do you? For shame. We whipped up some lemon lime ice milk and some fresh strawberry ice cream. The ice cream maker has done yeoman's duty since we figured out how to use it.

The best part, of course, except for seeing dear old friends is the leftovers. What a feast we had for lunch on the antipasto, and the chicken casserole had not deteriorated with age. Au Contraire. So now I'll have to diet all week, but it will have been worth it. One hopes.

We fed the cows the veggie scraps, and I would like to report that they do not at all like and in fact shunned the lettuce and raddichio that had been exposed to oil and vinegar. Acted like it was cow poison. Don't know what that's about. They liked everything else, and scarfed it down. The sweet faced young bull is no longer part of the herd. I knew he was on loan from another herd. He was the rascal who escaped a month or so ago. We'll miss his pleasant disposition and his randiness. Old Mama (Maggie) looks like she's preggars again. Big as a barn, and an odd time to calve. Whatcha gonna do? I dearly love those big creatures.

Onward,

Grapeshot