Alone with meat.

John's in Anchorage for the annual trade show and Symphony of Wines. Henry is en route back to Eugene. It's me, the pile of snow in front of the garage, the dog, and the cats.

The pile of snow serves as an excellent appetizer, whetting the appetite through vigorous exercise shoveling trying to avoid the high centering issue that preempted breakfast this morning.

Having conquered, at least for now, the snow stack: In the frig we find a flank steak, some fresh mushrooms, a delicously ripe mango, and miracle of miracles, both white (Yalumba unoaked Chardonnay, currently second runner up for favorite house wine) and several red wines, including Doña Paula Los Cardos Malbec, a favorite for Board meetings because it has a screw cap, is inexpensive and yummy.

Tidy up the kitchen, cut up the mango and add to last night's fruit salad of apples, strawberries and oranges. Pull out a white onion, some garlic, and two little red potatoes. Heat butter and olive oil in a little sauté pan for potatoes cut in 1/2 and sliced thinly, slice 1/2 the onion into 1/2 inch slices. Wash some romaine and tear it up and put on the plate. Dress it with lemon juice, olive oil and salt and pepper. Put the potatoes in their pan to begin browning and then put the onion slices in their pan. Decide for some reason to tournée the mushrooms, perhaps just to see if I still can. They "turned" out pretty well if I do say so myself.

Rub the steak with a little olive oil and salt and pepper it well. Heat the cast iron skillet over moderately high heat with butter/olive oil, the garlic clove, and the mushrooms face down. Once the garlic is looking pretty cooked, flip the mushrooms over, add the steak. Brown well on both sides. At some point, move the mushrooms over to the now on low heat onions. Cook the steak a few minutes on both sides until it feels done-ish (drat, one end is a little too done, the other too rare. Oh well.) remove from the pan and put on a plate and add a dollop of the red wine with a bit of butter. Shake until nice and saucy and pour over the steak. Slice it thinly and arrange nicely on the plate. Top with the onions and the mushrooms. (Who ever thought of tourneeing mushrooms in the first place? How odd.) And the potatoes. Pour a glass of wine.

Get a text from John saying he misses me and wishes he was home. I sent him a picture of dinner and said ditto.