Pig Roast, Summer’s A-Wastin’ Party

So, as I mentioned below, BIG food weekend.  John and I kicked it off all by our lonesome with another killicious din in the lounge at La Belle Vie.  If you go, order a cocktail (with alcohol or no) – they’re all gorgeous and tasty.  And then, feeling jazzy and chic, with ice cubes clinking merrily in a graceful glass, order the lamb burgers, pommes frites, the mache salad with artichokes and yogurt, and perhaps a tasty off the restaurant menu (you are presented with three menus in the lounge – the famous dining room tasting menu, the dining room a la carte menu, and the lounge menu; all rock).  Sit back, enjoy the elegant room, stare inconspicuously at people closing their eyes and moaning as they eat (the food is that good), and be grateful to be in such a pretty spot on a Friday night.

Sunday afternoon, John, Nathan, and I attended a neighborhood pig roast, put on by the Bennett’s and Anderson’s.  We arrived just as the 100-lb. pig was laid out on a big table, crisp and glistening, apple in mouth (but of course), looking very, graphically porcine.

 

 

 

 

I admit, I winced a bit as Ed and Bob sliced into the beast, but my guilt melted away as I was presented with a bite of crisp skin.  Holy Porky Cow, so intensely good.  Soon the roast was pulled into pieces and presented alongside soft buns and several different styles of barbecue sauce.  With a 1/2-block long table groaning with potluck sides (salads, bars, cookies, cakes), we definitely made ourselves a meal.  (Thanks Pam Van Ert for the pics!)

And last night, night of the tomato tart with Parmesan crust, we were invited to dinner at Sue & Louis Ainsworth’s for a Summer’s A-Wastin’ Party, along with Ana Scofield & Rudy Maxa, Genie & Joe Dixon, and Debbie & Stu Williams. We drank beautiful wine and ate gorgeous food – gougere, grilled shrimps, boned leg of lamb, ratatouille, salad, olive bread, cheeses, and raspberry cake for dessert. What a way to end a beautiful Labor Day weekend! (Pics here are from the party.)

And today…. Kind of a bust, today. Due to an irrigation system malfunction, part of our back yard is not just wet, it’s basically a swamp. A puppy-loving, dig-30-second-holes-in-the-mud kind of swamp. Bad. So, I drove all over the metro area to find a temporary fence, and installed said fence with Nathan (no easy task, 75 feet of fencing!), only to discover that even more of the yard is seriously wet than I realized, and Louis just dug a new mud hole on this side of the fence instead. Sigh.

Good thing he’s so cute… Anyhow, we weren’t done with the (useless) fence until almost 6 pm, ack, so dinner, which was going to be post-shower veggie share new potatoes in some sort of yummy hash, was instead…sweaty Domino’s pizza. Ah well.

And now – bedtime. Sleep tight, y’all.