A Weekend In Food and Pictures

The title says it all. We pretty much holed up this weekend and feasted upon whatever was around . . . and whatever I wanted to make.

Saturday morning struck me as good a time as any to make a lemon walnut cake (to follow Saturday night dinner). Incidentally, the cake turned out well (some Meyer lemon rind did the trick, though the cake was a bit dry since I used unbleached flour instead of bleached), but I tapped into it well before dinner and had dessert prepared by the cooks at Osaka instead. The cake holds up well over time; three days later and what little remains tastes good at just about any time of day!

Saturday's rain and gloom later brought on the desire for some stove-popped popcorn. With a light olive-oil flavor and a touch of salt, who would want to go back to microwave or theater popcorn? In any case, I make sure to leave the real stove-top poppin' to the pros:

Saturday night's home-cooked menu got pushed back to Sunday. Take note of oven-roasted pork chops with a lemon-orange-molasses (and dare I say butter?) glaze, lovingly prepared by Chef Fernandez chez Rue de Barcelone. I prepared a mushroom risotto to go along with, but the best addition was that of fresh pineapple rings. After years of eating the "flesh of the islands," I only discovered yesterday that the pineapple's core was not meant to be eaten! See? I'm not as advanced as you all may think. Of course, this meal would pair well with just about any oaky-noted vintage; Joe and I chose to go with the simple and understated Charles Shaw 2006 Sauvignon Blanc.

(That's it for now. Tomorrow I'll share a recipe from the weekend's wealth of offerings.)