Other People's Food

It's been a while since my last post, and I've covered a lot of ground since then, but I will keep this entry brief by concentrating on the highlights, and the pleasure of having had other people cook for me for much of the last ten days.  In Chicago last week, Jeff and Eve- with whom our tradition of mighty dinners really got rolling during grad school there in '94- made a simple yet perfect dinner of grilled duck breast, asparagus, couscous salad, and fruit for dessert.  They will be here tomorrow for a night; I'm looking forward to reciprocating with some much-awaited home cooking of my own.

The following night, Rick (who first turned me on to sous-vide cooking at home) made some monster T-bones in his water bath, plus roasted potatoes and braised carrots.  He's got a superb wine collection, and we drank a 1981 Kathryn Kennedy cabernet that tastes much younger than almost 30 years old, followed by a 1991 Dujac Clos St. Denis that is still a baby.  The more wine I drink, the more I come back to the simple truth that age is everything with well-made wine.

Last Monday, we had the pleasure of attending the wedding of some dear friends up here, and the subsequent reception at their house.  The groom is French, and they roasted a whole lamb on a spit in the back yard; there was much goodness to go with it.  A couple of other noteworthy flavors from these last few days included a 1997 López de Heredia rosé that had wonderful sherry and port notes underneath the elegant acid, the late dinner I had with my Brother at the Fatty Crab in NYC, and the later Korean barbecue post-opening in Williamsburg last night- complete with an open container citation (for a quarter inch of wine in a plastic cup I absentmindedly had in hand) on the way over as an appetizer.

What wedding is complete without a didjeriduet?