Bubble Heads

My girlfriend Kim is younger than I am. Old enough to drink but still to young to have tried it all. She likes beer, girly cocktails, and a few other libations. She dislikes wine or in her words,

"I'm just not old enough to appreciate it yet."

But we do drink champagne. And by drink it I mean consume copious amounts of sparkling wine in ALL it's various forms

Champagne

Presseco

Cava

Blush

Blanc de Noir

Blanc de Blanc

et all

We always spill a little when it's poured but we have yet to have it come shooting out when it's opened. (Knock on wood) And we ALWAYS finish the bottle.
On Christmas morning we had a bottle of champagne with omelets her dad made for our Jewish Christmas breakfast. By the end of breakfast we were slightly buzzed and a bit giddy. It was that morning that we came up with butterscotch tomato chips.
We went to Louisiana for a week at the end of the year and spent New Year's in New Orleans. I wanted to let her see where I grew up. In a matter of 48 hours we drank FOUR bottles of champagne:

1)we each had a bottle while at the Royal Sonesta for Brunch

2)there was the bottle in the afternoon (the best bottle of champagne ever)

3)the bottle of Rose Regale blush shared with my Grammy

4)I feel like there was another bottle in there but for the life of me I can't remember

Drinking champagne started between the two of us while she and I were just friends. It was the fourth anniversary of my Mom's death and she took me to dinner. I hope I never forget that night. She was wonderful. She bought a bottle of champagne so we could toast to my Mom. For a day that is supposed to be pretty crappy it was wonderful. Thank you sweetheart.
As you can see we celebrate the moments in life with a little bit of the bubbly. So here it is three days before Valentines and I'm searching for the perfect meal to share with the love of my life. Nothing is good enough and I'm afraid I'll cooking something she won't like. I used our love of champagne as the inspiration for the meal. This is the preliminary menu:

Cocktail

Sgroppino

Prosecco, vodka, lemon sorbet, and mint leaves

Salad

Winter Green Salad with Green Apple Vinaigrette

Main Course

T-Bone Steak or New York Strip

Gruyere Potato Gratin

Dessert

Chocolate Souffles

or

Chocolate Truffles and Cold Zabaglione

Box Brownies?

I was reading the Washington Post's Food section on Wednesday and found a new recipe for brownies, Man-Catcher_Brownies to be exact. I proceeded to tell my girlfriend about the recipe and that I thought I'd make them. To which she responds,

"I don't like homemade brownies".

How can you not like homemade brownies? You can control all the chocolaty goodness you put in them. I should have learned by now that she doesn't mean ALL of them just the few she has tried.

Her mother tried to make me feel better by telling me about the peanut butter maker she had when the the girls were younger. Long story short about the peanut butter. My girlfriend and her sister like processed food.

So my girlfriend decides that she's going to make brownies from a box while I'm standing there saying I'd like to make her brownies. You'd think that I would be a rational person and think:

1)YEAH!! now I don't have to cook

2)If you make brownies from a box there's less to clean up

3)well I don't know what the third rational argument should be but there should be one (if you come up with it let me know).

At this point I've decided that I shall pout and say that processed brownies are horrid. I also decide I will not eat one of her vile brownies with God knows what in them. I have not made boxed brownies since I was eight. That's two entire decades I've gone without making or eating them. To her credit the

Ghiradelli Triple Chocolate Brownies

she made and I relented and tried were quite tasty. However, as someone wanting to go to pastry school I can not believe that she made such a blanket statement about homemade brownies.

Since the brownie blunder we have talked and I now understand that she doesn't dislike all homemade brownies and she will try any I make for her. I just hope and pray she likes them.

Stay tuned for details of the dinner I'm planning for our pre-Valentine celebration.

How it started

I remember where and when she said I'll just never be able to quote her verbatim. We were at work at Legal Seafoods working one of our first shifts upstairs together. She was telling me about the girls in her life. One was a vegetarian, another a vegan, one ate seafood and a unique combination of meat product but she couldn't seem to keep them all straight. Which girl was she going out with for dinner the next time? She always seemed to mix them up. They were all just too picky for her. I thought she's cool. She MUST like all sorts of foods. I grew up eating almost everything. I love food and was excited to have someone to go on new food adventures with. I hadn't dated a woman in over five years and was happily dating a man. So we were JUST friends. It was great. It still is for that matter. It all changed one Tuesday night. Thanks Ross. Kim and I just started. You can say it was the vodka, but I think it was just meant to be. I digress...I brought up the food for a reason. So here I was starting to date this phenomenal woman who loved different foods, right? WRONG. She has to be the pickiest person I have ever met. For example, she told me she likes nuts. That's not exactly true she doesn't actually like nuts she'll eat peanuts but not any other nuts. There are many similar picky food combinations I've come across. She will try things IF she's in the mood and not too many new things at one time. I'm on my way to culinary school and love to try/cook new things. Watch while I go through the list of her likes, dislikes, attempt to cook around them, sneak things in to get her to try, and pick new places for us to try. It should be great fun for us all.