the gourmet club

I was all excited for tonight, because Jim had invited a colleague over for dinner and I was going to make the restaurant-quality dish I first made back on Valentine's Day.

I went so far as to buy real nutmeg, as I had been substituting allspice instead (given that it was what was in my spice cabinet). I got four really lovely center-cut pork chops and a bunch of good-looking zucchini. Jim brought up an extra chair from the garage, and I was all set to use the fine china. I even pondered buying an iron to iron the linen napkins.

Unfortunately, said colleague ended up not traveling from Manchester to Portland today, so we were out one dinner guest.

I contemplated changing the evening's menu but we were looking forward to the deliciousness, so I went ahead with the plan.

I think it was even better tonight (maybe because I put more shallot in the sauce?). It's still slightly amazing to me that I can cook food that's more than worthy of company. Seriously? So. Good.

Anyway, I was mopping up the sauce with a good herbed dinner roll when I recalled The Gourmet Club.

When I was young, my parents were in a group called The Gourmet Club. They would meet at the house of one of the couples every so often (probably one night a month? I really wasn't paying attention) and cook fancy food. We kids never ate any of the food, again as far as I can remember -- can you tell this was definitely not a "kids included!" kind of activity? -- but the grown-ups certainly seemed to enjoy it. I don't think there were more than four or five couples in the group, but I do know that my folks became pretty good friends with at least some of them, and I played/grew up with kids of other Gourmet Club members for the whole rest of my young life.

I don't really have even the vaguest idea of where I'm going with this. Guess I kind of just wanted to resurrect the Gourmet Club, if only in the most random of reminiscences. And who knows? Maybe it deserves some of the credit for my love of chefdom.

Or maybe it just got my parents a night to socialize with other adults in a world of child-rearing. Either way, I'm glad it existed.