food, once again.

My dear, it's been a whole week since I made my friends dinner and I have not told you all about it! (Don't you love that I write this as if I have more than 2-3 regular readers of this blog? Oh, you care, you person looking for "pictures of ______" in google! YOU CARE!)

One paragraph done and I'm already off track. Let's just get to the menu of dinner last week, which looked like this:

(you can click that if you want, and around it you'll find close-ups if you really care. Which I know you do, dear reader!)

Appetizer: Gouda and organic cheddar with no-knead bread and crackers.
Salad: Mixed greens with grapes, craisins, toasted walnuts and feta (with balsamic orange dressing).
Additional Salad: Beets, carmelized onions, and goat cheese. (oh my god, this was yummy. Also, half of my friends didn't like beets. More for me!)
Other thing: Yukon gold mashed potatoes with pesto.
Dessert (not pictured): fresh strawberries (really, we were all full).

So, I didn't really have a main course which I feel is fine. I thought I did a pretty good job at showcasing local produce and my friends were happy with the results. Success!

In other food news, I'm starting to realize how much fun this cooking from scratch thing is. I've always enjoyed cooking for myself, but cooking for myself hasn't been quite as labor intensive or creative since I started forcing myself to use seasonal produce. I can easily spend an hour constructing the perfect salad and vegetable side for lunch and be completely happy. I'm almost completely off of processed foods and feeling good. What's the problem? I will not have time for a lot of this when I have to work again in the fall - I will have 22 minutes to EAT, let alone prepare anything (which is why I live for leftovers). In the meantime though, I'm inviting more people over for dinner.

p.s. places like this make me wonder why anyone buys cookbooks anymore.