Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Cause for Celebration - Rack of Lamb

We have many reasons to celebrate - in addition to good health and being surrounded by good friends we have had milestone birthdays and work triumphs. Apparently, in a nod to the momentous occasion, there was a sale on some beautiful racks of lamb and I gobbled one up, literally. 
Lamb is one of my favorite special occasion foods - it is generally what I request for my birthday dinner - so I jumped at the chance to make my very first rack of lamb. I went a fairly traditional route, serving it with a breadcrumb crust - it was perfectly simple and delicious. I served it with an Indian summer panzanella complete with a decadent amount of burrata. Everything was perfect and we enjoyed it all with a celebratory bottle of wine, a highly recommended accompaniment.



Monday, October 15, 2012

Trying New Things - Pastitsio

Fall must be upon us because I got my first craving of the season for hearty food. Instead of wanting a refreshing salad with tomatoes I wanted some cozy comfort food. I had seen a recipe for pastitsio in Saveur that piqued my interest and decided to give it a go. I wanted to mix it up a little so I found a variation on that recipe in an old Gourmet that used eggplant and had a feta bechamel (because the lamb meat sauce just wouldn't be rich enough by itself). I LOVED this recipe - of course I tweaked it slightly (less salt, nutmeg instead of clove, less cinnamon) . . .suffice it to say, we both had thirds.
Along with ushering in fall foods I had the great pleasure of attending the beautiful wedding of some great friends  and wanted to follow up the rehearsal dinner photos with some quick snaps from the main event.