With little
exception, every Tuesday for the past two years I've joined my grandparents for
dinner at their house, for what we've come to call Tuesday Supper Club. It's
invite-only for the generation of grands-- granddaughters, grandnieces--so
parents are never there. We grands are always encouraged to bring
friends, roommates, boyfriends, and the like. The only rule my Grandma has is
that you cannot bring someone you met the night before. "Two nights prior
is fine," however.
My Grandma is an extraordinary cook, my grandfather a true wine lover, and both
are incredible storytellers. Each Tuesday feast begins with a strong pour of
either Edna Valley Chardonnay or an Italian Sangiovese (my Grandfather's go-to
starter favorites). Over an appetizer, we get an introduction to the meal we
will be eating and the story behind where it came from. We catch up on our
weeks and then head to the dining room to eat. The conversation then shifts to
stories from decades we didn't know with words that we don't use anymore: Punch
boards, wing-walkers, and murder boards, "Say what?! Grandad?"
On a really special night, we'll get my Granddad to bring out the model drones
he designed in the 60's. "Tell us something classified, come on..."
and he'll just chuckle and continue on about the training program for pilots
and how impossible it was to try and knock one of these bad boys out of the
air. We'll continue to drink wine, and needle for the juicy details of
their lives, the parts that our own parents could never really pass on in the
same light. Just as we begin to feel the relaxing post-feast/wine lull set in,
my Grandma will sneak out and come back with a homemade dessert. Have I
mentioned her baking is extraordinary? Over Bananas Foster, chocolate cake, or
strawberry tarts, we'll finish off the last of the wine, and wrap up another
meeting of the Tuesday Supper Club.
I've never blogged about Tuesday Supper Club before. I'm not sure why, but I
suspect it's because I treasure the break from anything online when I'm there.
It's the three hours of my week that I slip into their world, and walk away
completely rejuvenated. I've never really been able to put into words or images
quite what it's like to sit around the table with two of the most incredible
souls.
Last night, however, my Grandma went above and beyond with an Irish
Feast that changed my feelings on blogging about this. Exact recipes from her
dinner while eating at Ballyhoe in Ireland in the late 80's...we looked, the
pictures in the recipe book she brought back were exactly what these look like.
Grandad opened some very special bottles of wine, and all four of us grands
(myself, Devon, Kiki and Meggie) just about died when we tried Grasshopper Pie
for the first time.
"I haven't made this recipe for a good 30 years,"
my Grandma divulged, "but I needed something green"...It was divine.
Irish
Salad with mixed greens, tomatoes, hard boiled egg, beets, and a mustard cream
dressing.
Lamb Stew with potatoes, onions, carrots and peas.
Grasshopper Pie. The whipped and frozen marshmallow in this frozen treat was delightfully light and fluffy and I totally ate half of Kiki's.
