mamadeb

Another birthday story:

by

kressel=Jane Austen/Jewish pastiche "canon" pairings. She provides a short explanation. It's not finished, but if you know Pride and Prejudice, you'll love it.

My birthday celebration:

Well, first of all, it was Shabbat, so that kinda tones it down anyway.

Friday night, after dinner, we went to a friend's house. Her birthdday is this coming Tuesday, so her husband planned a very nice surprise. He invited people to stop by after 7:15, which is dessert time. Hindi, who is a baalat hachnosis orchim - they take hospitality seriously and they never have an empty shabbos table, even when all three of their daughters are away - thought nothing of it. People were on an after dinner walk, they stopped by to say "Good Shabbos", and stayed to chat. Nothing unusual. The girls made sure we had tea.

And then they started pulling fruit out of nowhere and we all sang Happy Birthday, and she was delighted. We stayed about an hour and then went home.

I never left the house Shabbos day. I meant to, but my husband gave me two more books. One was Mark Crispin Miller's Fooled Again, about documented election...well. It made me very, very angry. The other was a book on cookbooks called Manly Meals and Mom's Home Cooking, and it was a lot of fun to read. And I read it all day. :)

After Shabbos, we went out to dinner - to a place that has been around for a couple of years but we'd never heard of until recently. It's called Grille de Paris, and it's a French-steak house. The restaurant itself is very pretty. It's a standard store-front size, with marble floor tiles and yellow and blue paint. Very bright and welcoming. The ceiling was fun - they'd installed tiny fiber-optic lights that changed colors, so it was like looking at a starry sky.

And it was empty. Totally empty. At 8:30, we were alone in the place. Which made us somewhat uncomfortable, as you can imagine.

The menu was extensive but when we asked about a veal dish, we were told no veal that night (and I'd so wanted osso bucco!)

We ended up sharing a grilled eggplant salad (warm eggplant, tomatoes, field greens and garlic slices) and a glass of shiraz. This was served in a brand snifter. It was delicious, though, with a spicy aftertaste.

I had duck l'orange, and he ordered steak au poivre, which he loves. And which this isn't. There was a rich brown sauce, but almost no peppercorns. He liked it, but it wasn't what he'd wanted. The duck was very nice. I took home half - anyone have ideas about what to do with 1/4 of a duck? They both came with whipped potatoes and grilled vegetables. I've gotten too used to my mashed potatoes, which I made with butter/margarine or milk, real or fake. These were almost too rich.

We were presented with the desert [sic] menu. And inside, we were told that all deserts [sic] came with pareve ice cream.

So what did we get? Espresso. :)

It was a pretty place, but the prices were more Manhattan than Brooklyn and the food wasn't at that level. We probably will not go there again.