Jim's Blog

Dinner out... but in

One of the things that we can't do as easily anymore is go out for dinner. It usually feels like more trouble than it's worth. Luckily for us I like cooking. Or, at least taking a "regular" meal and trying to make it taste fancy by making it look fancy. I think that you've won half the battle just by making it look good, regardless how it actually tastes.

Here's a pork chop, sweet potato and some veggies.

Looks nice ya? But we used to go out to fancy places. Places were you had to get courses and things came on little plates for sharing, all served with a good wine. Doing this at a restaurant will easily run over a 100 $, but I can spend way less than that at the grocery store. So last night first course was antipasto with fresh bread and olive oil and balsamic vinegar for dipping. I only took a picture of the antipasto.

Then we had beef tenderloin (~ 9 $) and seared tuna (~ 11 $). We split it to have surf and turf. Some how the beef was more tender than the fish - I'm not sure how that happened but it was like heaven.

Of course you've got to have dessert, but I don't bake (other than creme brulee). So I bought a couple of sneeze guard treats from the store (3$ each).

Not exactly a cheap meal, but maybe around 20 $ / person wine included. Much cheaper than going out, especially now I'll have to work in the cost of a baby sitter.

Just because I love my creme brulee so much, here's a picture. We like mine much more than any that we've tried in a restaurant. I think that the key is keeping it simple and actually using real vanilla beans.