ribs, birthdays, spare the air

After I made the last post, I went to work at Sur La Table in the city. I was a kitchen assistant for the ribs class. Y-U-M! Y'all know that I don't really like cherries, but I'm slowly easing myself into their fan-base. I like the black ones with the pits. Well, my favorite rib style of the night was the cherry sauce! Imagine that? All of the ribs were good in their own right, but that one would be a croud-pleaser..... And maybe a set of the spicy ones for me and Jen R. :>) Because some of the cooking classes are sponsored by Bon Appetit, all of the recipes were provided by them. In addition to ribs, they gave some Haagen Dazs ice cream coupons to the teacher and added a Peanut Brittle and Caramel Crunch Ice Cream Pie recipe. That, my friends, was double Y-U-M! It's spremely sweet (caramel sauce, peanut brittle) with the salty crunch (peanuts) with the taste of summer (ice cream). It's a long recipe, but well worth it. After class, I had a dream of hosting a BBQ party. Ribs, ice cream pie, salty potato chips, and various salads. What could say "summer" more?

Not that I've mentioned birthdays in a while, but there have been quite a few recently. Luke, a blog reader but not-so-much a blog writer of late, had his birthday on June 16th. He started it all. It was followed by Grandma Barbara and Papa's 31st anniversary on June 19th. Two birthday parties on June 20th made my Saturday. Thank you to Firmino and Cathy for being born! Thank you for the good BBQs, the Safeway cakes for dessert, and the odd drink concoction that Phillip created for me. My cousin, Anna, turned the big 2-0 on June 22nd. June 23rd is a hard date for me to forget as it's the anniversary of Heather and Ian's wedding. Given how involved I was in planning their wedding and the crazy couple of weeks before it, I know that I can't forget that date any time soon, but I don't remember if I called them to say "happy anniversary"... :>) And, finally the last date of the two week span is June 25th. That's Grandma Barbara's birthday. Since I worked that night and didn't go with the family to dinner, I'm taking Grandma out for lunch today. I'm thinking lunch and a movie to hide from the heat....

It's the third "Spare the Air" day in a row today. I'm tired. I refused to help with carts last night at work as I was already out of breath just bagging people's stuff. I like Courtesy Clerk Bruce, but the health is more important. The world needs better public transit and less burning of stuff! Despite my ode to the BBQ earlier, I do recognize that it's an air polluter. If it's any consolation, all the ribs we ate in class were made in an oven... You can't BBQ in a basement.