Sunday, April 17, 2011

Celebrating!

Birthday's are great opportunities to celebrate people in your life.  Yesterday we got the pleasure of celebrating Mom's birthday here at our apartment.  We invited Mom and Tom down to celebrate Mom's special day with the lure of making the birthday meal. 

And then the fun began!

What to cook?!  I wanted it to be special for the occasion, so I wanted to do more than grill some burgers,  but at the same time it needs to be fairly simple in ingredients.  Mom doesn't like much "fanciness" in her food.  However, I will give her credit that recently while at a work dinner party (that I got the invite to be her guest) they had calamari as an appetizer and she ate it.  I about fell off my seat in shock.  But I digress.  In most cases simple ingredients are the key to Mom's heart.  If you are talking no salad dressings or condiments, you are talking Mom's language.

So I began reading my cookbooks as my past time this week on a quest for the perfect meal.  I bookmarked pages, made mental notes, and made my final selections.

The menu that shaped up and was served:

Italian Stuffed Mushrooms
Salad
Bruschetta Chicken
Angel Hair Pasta
Birthday Confetti Cupcakes

And since the main course was the first attempt at the dish, I am happy to say it turned out great!
It was topped off with a restaurant feel of cloth napkins and napkin rings, two forks in the cutlery placement on the table...I mean we are talking F.A.N.C.Y.

But in all seriousness, it was a really enjoyable evening.  I appreciate their willingness to travel to us so we could do that.

And with the sun shining today and summer on the near horizon, I get even more excited about all the places I want to explore and check out.  Nate and I were realizing that there are several places that one of us has eaten at but the other hasn't and still a few places we both would like to go to but haven't made it to yet.  So we started brainstorming a list and for the sake of remembering, I'm writing it down.

The Pittt-Anderson
Sohm's-Pendleton
The Nile-Anderson
Bread Ladies-Greenfield
The Lemon Drop-Anderson
The Toast-Anderson
Bonge's Tavern-Perkinsville
Good's Candy Shop-Anderson
Nancy's Pizza-Fishers
addendum 5/2
Mama Carolla's-thanks Katy!

3 comments:

  1. Last year we had a work dinner at The Nile in Anderson. It was delicious. Highly recommended. I'm also glad to hear the birthday dinner was a success. We're going home to celebrate Kyle's and a few of his family member's birthdays this weekend. Bday parties are always a good time!

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  2. I love your blog, Leslie! We are regulars at Good's Candy Shop for ice cream, so maybe we'll see you there. Or if you want to avoid 3 wild children, get your ice cream "to go" if you see a blue Honda Odyssey in the parking lot! :) Also - if you've never been to Mama Carolla's in Broad Ripple - it's a MUST! YUM!

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  3. Thanks, Katy! We will look for the Odyssey and join your party if you are at Good's at the same time ;) And thanks for the bonus food suggestion, we readily take additions to the list!!

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