Tonight, DH and I took my IL's to a beer and food pairing event at the NYS Wine and Culinary Center. In honor of St. Patrick's Day but in keeping with the NYSWCC's emphasis on eating locally, it was various NYS beers paired with traditional St. Patrick's Day foods made from local ingredients.
It was amazingly good, and it was an amazing amount of food. I always think of "tastings" as being little nibbles of something and little sips of something. I had actually had the passing thought of eating a small dinner before I left home. Glad I didn't! This was an actual meal. Appetizer of cold salmon on Irish Soda Bread with an herbed mayo--amazing, and I'm not a fan of cold fish. Corned beef and cabbage--very good, and I'm not a fan of corned beef. My fave was the lamb stew with potato three ways, although I only ate my potato one way, so to speak, because at that point I was ready to burst. Dessert was a chocolate bread pudding kind of thing, with ice cream made from Irish Red Ale. Sounds weird? Yes, it was a bit mind-bending to be able to taste beer in my ice cream but it was also surprisingly tasty! The pudding was also good but by then I had to admit defeat and left quite a bit of it on my plate. Each course had a different type of beer paired with it; they were more circumspect with their servings in that regard--probably all four tastings added up to one actual glass, and maybe even a short one at that. But that's all you needed. Again, any more and....kablam. Plus there was that hour drive home to think about.
In any case, we had a really nice time. That was our first time doing one of those events and we're definitely going back for other ones. They do a wide range of food-related programs and cooking classes focused on using local ingredients. I think I've found something to add to my Empty Nest List--cooking classes!
On the fabric front, pictured is my recent medicinal fabric purchase. When I was down with food poisoning, I fell victim to a Hancock's of Paducah sale email. It hit me at a weak point. On the other hand, I also figured that form of doctoring was still cheaper than a hospital stay. In any case, I had enough presence of mind to only purchase fabric that would fill in some blanks in my stash. I ignored all the pretty, pretty prints that threatened to turn my sleep- and food-deprived head. All of these were somewhere in the neighborhood of 50% off, and I got a yard of each. Not terribly exciting, but definitely useful!
I had a little bit of time to work on the Floral Bouquet quilt today--got the center part trimmed and squared up and the border segments sewn together. Tomorrow I just put the border on, get the backing ready, and hopefully drop it off at the long-armers. I'll post a photo once the border is on. I'm pleased with the way it's come together, although I've got an amazing amount of scrap I'll now feel the need to do something creative with...
Sandy's blog on quilting, life, and sundry.
