Corner of Bourbon & Division

I had the Parental Units over to dinner tonight, my first honest-to-goodness Grown-Up Dinner since I moved in here, and frankly the second Grown-Up Meal I've served since moving out of my parents' place six and a half years ago. Having a proper dining room table helps with that. The only other time I've had people over for a properly cooked meal was when joane and shenlo came by on New Year's Day 2007 and I fed them lunch.

I made a similar menu today, actually. At least, I made lemon-tarragon roasted cornish hen and wild rice with almonds and raisins, which is the same thing I made last time. This time I varied things a little bit in terms of the entrée, the side dish, and dessert. I made a squash soup the way I learned from ai731 the last time I went to visit her and the_exclamation at the Coalition stronghold: made directly inside the shell of the squash. Delicious. I also improvised a side dish of steamed green beans sautéed with garlic and pine nuts in olive oil, which added a touch of colour to the plate but didn't overwhelm what was otherwise meant to be a fairly subtle main course.

For dessert I made brownies for the first time in about ten years, and they turned out delicious and moist and squidgy. My parents like them with walnuts, so I obliged by putting them in this time. I also served sliced pear with the brownies, as a way to cleanse the palate somewhat.

Overall, as meal planning goes, this was an unmitigated success. Nothing was overcooked, and in spite of some anxiety on my part the timing on everything was perfect. The only thing that went "wrong" was that I had way too much food. It all got put away in Tupperware, and will serve as my lunches this week, so it's all good, really.

I also got a really nice white wine to go with the meal. It was a bit of an educated shot in the dark, but I ended up with a Willm Riesling (2007), which is an Alsatian wine. Nice and dry, it complemented the food beautifully. I'm putting it on my list of wines to look out for in the future. It's a wee bit pricy ($20 or so), but well worth it. I had three glasses and was a wee bit giddy for a while, though nothing to write home about.

My parents were in good form, although a bit tired, as they'd hosted a dinner party of their own for some people from my father's university last night. I think my mother enjoyed not having to cook for once, although she insisted on helping me clean up, which was actually really great. If she hadn't, I'd still be cleaning now instead of updating my LJ.

My father spent most of the time rummaging in my bookcases, exploring my library, which has expanded considerably since he last looked at it seriously. He's quite impressed with the Ikea bookcases, as they look a lot nicer than he expected. He found one of my books of limericks, and spent a long while giggling at some of the funnier ones, while my mother and I dealt with dishes and leftovers.

They left in very good spirits, which was all to the good. As a practice run for the other Grown-Up Dinner Parties I want to have in the future, it went really well. It has shown me that I can definitely pull this off, although I will have to plan further in advance if I want to have more than two or three people over at the same time.

I am now going to go fall over dead. I only got about four hours of sleep this morning, as I had to go food shopping and then prepare said food. I've been on my feet and running around since noon, after four hours of sleep and a twelve-hour shift behind me.

I'm going into work tomorrow for an evening shift, and will be doing swing shift most of the week (or variants thereof). No news yet on whether or not my weekend is toast.