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Drinks at the Charleston bar before dinner, with complimentary truffle potato chips.

L and I went to Charleston’s last night for our anniversary. Last time we were there was nearly a decade ago. Charleston —owned and operated by the Charleston Group with renown chef Cindy Wolf at the helm and her husband, Tony Foreman, running all operations— is a good mix for us: southern cuisine for L, upscale southern cuisine for me. We had an amazing time.

We started the evening in their polished bar, a perfect, Maker’s Mark manhattan for me and a cosmopolitan for L. Complimentary truffle potato chips with reggiano cheese and a truffle sauce were provided (all pictured above). Woo boy… I haven’t had a MMM in years and years. It nearly felled me from my barstool, but somehow we made it to the dining room. It was L’s first cosmopolitan, and she was quite pleased.

The menu was a cross between …

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Neighbor’s tree, basking in the street light.

I didn’t even know these little gems existed…

Mike scales the intermediate side of the climbing wall, making it all theway to the top. I only made it half way up the beginner’s wall. But I shall return….

L is one of a handful on the list to cook for the post-liturgy lunch at the parish tomorrow. The spec is “entree’ and side for 50 people”. Another on the list is out of town, and after striking out with other cooks called me to see if we could do double duty, graciously offering to pay for the food. So we’re cooking for 100: beast stew with red wine, butter, garlic, herbs, Celtic Sea Salt, red onions, french potatoes, green beans and stock. Po-man’s meal, yes, but we’re essentially poor after Christmas spending so I’m fine with that.

Bought a shiny, new 40qt aluminum pot to handle the load, as our last large pot has mysteriously disappeared and the parish kitchen only had a 20qt pot to offer. What a monster!

I’m hoping this works out. I usually cook for a handful, not for a hundred. I firmly believe, however, that any stew will be quite edible when cooked with enough red wine, butter and garlic. But I’m no Julia Child… although after watching Julie and Julia last night I wish I were!

Update on January 25, 2010 by Jim

Somehow or another the recipe —if you can call it that— has gone missing. Here it is:

• 10lbs of chopped meat
• 5lbs carrots
• 2lbs bakers’ potatoes
• one big honkin’ can of green beans
• several red onions (pearl onions might actually be better)
• a pound of butter
• 2/3s beef stock and 1/3 red wine for the base

Season to taste with:

• Sea salt (use more salt that you think you should)
• Crushed black pepper
• basil
• thyme
• oregano
• rosemary

You could add other veggies, I just ran out of money so I couldn’t

We’ve had a stray mother cat and her four kittens hanging around lately. We started feeding them and then gave them a nice box where they’ve been staying for several nights. I decided to upgrade them to a a modified kitty litter dome, complete with fleece mat, towels and catnip, but no kitty litter. That would be messy. This should keep out the wind and rain, at least.

Zeke, aka “the one eyed wonder kitty” (Laura) and “dumb-head” (Ana), is always sharpening himself on the door mats. I bought him this kitty-scratcher-mat thingy as it resembles the door mat, but all he’s done so faris lick it and roll around on it. Must have kitty pot embedded in it.

Having white tea for the first time. I thought it would be, well, white. You know, like green tea is greenish. Anyway, it has a wonderful bouquet and is quite nice. It’s supposed to be the healthiest tea one can drink.

This particular kind is from Twinings, a third the price of the other brand at Whole Foods. Perhaps on my birthday I’ll get the expensive stuff.