Another fine meal...

I picked up this wonderful cooking magazine called "Clean Eating". I was very impressed by all the recipes and use of fresh foods. We decided to try this delicious pork chop marinated with balsamic, honey, and rosemary served with grilled peaches. We thought we'd try a Rose we got from Palmina winery. It was very tasty and not sweet at all which was surprising. Another culinary success!

Happy Father's Day!

Happy Father's Day to all the Papas out there. We spent our morning with the kids (Magnus and Presto). Here we are right after a run with Magnus. Hope everybody takes time out to celebrate and have a relaxing day! Enjoy, Molly and Steve.

Friday Supper Club

Thanks to all for coming to the 1st Friday Supper Club dinner.

Our hosts were Molly and Steve.

Dinner was big fun and very tasty. Thanks to everybody's creative input and precise execution of the dishes.

Everybody had a relaxing good time.

Marty was a friend to all dogs.

Jon had a bit too much fun!

And CA spends a special moment with her longtime friend.

The rest of the photos can be found here:

http://gallery.me.com/stefo36#100182

Thanks again, looking forward to the next one! Molly and Steve

Holy Garden!

Sis- can you believe the size of these plants? It's only June!

The picture below is 2 weeks ago, the one above is today. I am going to have so many tomatoes! These are the biggest plants I've ever grown. Very excited.

Chimichurri what?

We got our fist shipment of wine from Palmina Winery. They ship quarterly and include recipes that complement the wine you get in each shipment. We decided to try one out a week ago. After looking them over we decided to try the Argentine Grilled Rib-Eyes with Chimichurri sauce and the Tritono Malbec. I've never purchased a rib eye, they are huge! Any steak would work for this recipe. In fact this sauce is so good you could use it on fish, chicken, or pork. Steve grilled up the steaks and some yams, and we sauteed some green beans to complete this feast. We were pleased that Drew decided to join the experiment to provide his critique of the meal. I think I can speak for us all and say it was delicious and a complete success.

Bath time

Bathing the dog is a family affair. Magnus is pretty good about the scrub down. Presto likes watch. I wonder if his doggie thoughts wonder why the cat does not get a bath too. Two nights ago we were sitting in the living room. Peston was drinking out of the pool and Magnus nosed the cat into the pool! I've never seen Prestos eyes get so big. I ran out, he ran in and under the bed. I wish I had the camera, but I only have the tale to tell. It was very funny.

Solvang in detail...food and wine

Wednesday 29-April. After riding Figueroa Mountian Road our culinary odyssey started at Melville Winery, suggested to us by Thomas the Sommelier/Bartender at our hotel restaurant. Nice place (photo above) and great wines. The tasting room host, Alvin, was quite a character. He gave us two great suggestions for visits the next day...Palmina Winery in the "wine ghetto" and the La Purisima Mission in Lompoc. There is an understanding in the wine producing community that allows them to all plug each other's wines. However, the suggestion to visit the mission was mostly a shameless plug for us to go see some of Alvin's other work: besides working at Melville, he has been crafting models of each of the California Missions that are sold in the gift shops for the past 12 years. But that is for a later blog entry.

Back in Solvang we tasted at a couple of popular places. Seeking advice on where to eat later, the tasting room hosts were very helpful in suggesting Root 246, a brand new restaurant attached to a trendy new resort. Already we had received valuable suggestions from people who found out that we were newlyweds, but this experience topped everything so far. While deciding which lounge to hang out in for dinner (there are two separate lounges, one themed "white" for formal and the other "black" for a more relaxed atmosphere) we met Mike from Demetria Winery. He was in the restaurant showcasing their wines so we jumped at the opportunity to enjoy a flight during dinner. Mike snapped a photo of us and invited us to the winery, which seemed totally normal until he mentioned that we'd have to enter a gate code to enter the vineyard. He left us to enjoy our dinner, which was absolutely amazing. 

On our way out the door after dinner, the hostess asked us if we'd like to meet the chef, Bradley Ogden. Thinking he would just pop out and say hi, we were surprised when we were guided into the kitchen. The place was amazing! It was a highly refined assembly line of gourmet goodness, incredibly clean and stocked with the finest local fresh ingredients. We were really blown away by the whole experience, especially when the whole kitchen staff congratulated us as newlyweds.