I was feeling rustic... We had fresh meat pierogies from Delightful Pastries (I think I like the potato & cheese ones better, though), sauteed in butter with some shallots and chopped bacon; a pot of navy beans (that seemed to take forEVER to cook... I need to get my hands on a pressure cooker again), with kielbasa, kale, garlic, thyme and a splash of balsamic; cold Zywiec beer; and my husband made creme bruleé from the heart-shaped ramekins of the Rose Levy Berenbaum kit I got him for Christmas a few years back.
“Assuredly it is a great accomplishment to be a novelist, but it is no mediocre glory to be a cook.” -- Alexandre Dumas
"I give you Chicago. It is no London and Harvard. It is not Paris and buttermilk. It is American in every chitling and sparerib. It is alive from tail to snout." -- H.L. Mencken