John gets lamb

We celebrated our 28th anniversary on Saturday with Thad & Lynn, Ren & James. Consensus was, among those consulted, that roast chicken should be the basis of the menu.

Now, we had planned to have lamb racks for dinner a couple of weekends ago, and when John opened the packages as he prepared to put them on the grill, they were totally spoiled, stinky and awful (unusual for meat from Costco). So he has been in a lamb withdrawal mode for a bit, and we do usually celebrate our anniversary with lamb chops, it just seems so fitting some how. But the guest list inclined to roast chicken.

So we had roast chicken and dang good it was too, with a wild rice pilaf, breaded sauteed zucchini coins, carrots rapé, tossed green salad with homemade croutons, and a pear crisp with vanilla ice cream for dessert. The wines were excellent - Scharffenberger sparkling to start, La Posta Malbec all dark and cherry-ful, Chasing Venus voluptuous sauvignon blanc, and A to Z Sauvignon Blanc crisp and full, and the evening was swell over all.

But John still held a yearning for lamb, and mentioned lamb several times to many of us in a way that made clear that he wanted lamb.

So, as an anniversary gift, I got him a nice little boneless leg of lamb for him to cook for dinner Sunday - which he did perfectly with mushroom sauce and the left over wild rice, even better today, some steamed broccoli, a tossed green salad, and a very nice Alexander Valley red.

I think he is happy now.