The Weekly Newsletter
Menus and Stories for February 11 - 15, 2008
It's Valentine's Day this week

Valentine’s Day is on a Thursday this year. Wouldn’t you really rather stay home? We’ll make your dinner, all you need to provide is the warm place, the person, and the dishes (though you could just eat it from our to-go containers if you’d rather).

Please place your order by Wednesday (or earlier). We’ll have your dinners ready for you to pick up on Thursday by 4:30. You can pick ‘em up until we close at 6.

Here’s the menu for this year:

At the Start:
Lemon Shrimp with a Caper Aioli

The Salad:
Romaine Hearts with Candied Walnuts, Dried Cherries, and a Raspberry Vinaigrette

The Dinner:
Beef Tenderloin stuffed with Fresh Spinach, Red Peppers, and Gorgonzola served with a Port Wine Sauce

Scalloped Potatoes with Applewood-smoked Bacon

Balsamic Brussels Sprouts

Sour Cream Biscuits

The Dessert:
A Chocolate Strawberry Shortcake (whee!)

The price is 28.95 per person.
Want us to save a couple of ‘em for you?
Call us at 252-1500 or just tell the folks in the shop when you come by.

(and no, that is not a heart, but is a little glass "hand cooler" I made the other day. It reminds me of a little Valentine's Day thing...)

A nice story in a new magazine

What a treat the other day I had when I arrived at work and found this month's edition of NC Signature magazine with a very nice story about us. That was a fun little pop of energy for me (and us.)

And Eric Weiner's The Geography of Bliss is climbing the NY Times Bestseller list. When it first came out it was # 21, which was pretty good, I thought. The next week it was #8! The NEXT week it dropped down to #9 because an unauthorized biography of Tom Cruise popped in for a few minutes, but then by last week it was back to # 8. A while ago I had a secret wish to be on the NY Times Top Ten Bestseller list. The truth is that I had meant that I wanted to be there for my own book but to be truthful I was not specific with my wish. So, since I AM in Eric's book and his book IS in the top ten um, I guess my wish has been granted.

North Carolina Signature
Almost Bisque

Here's a snap of that Candy Roaster Squash that I showed you last month, though this one is cut and ready to become soup. This special heirloom squash is just one of the local produce finds we're lucky enough to be able to buy and then turn into great foods for you. It's harder in the winter as you might imagine, but it's almost spring - hooray! (According to the Celtic calendar, it IS spring - which I like!)

Dinners to go

Dinners, as you know, come with a freshly-made green salad, salad dressing of the day, and made-right-here bread of the day. We take reservations until noon or so. Please order by phone (252-1500), by FAX (252-02002) or stop in to speak to one of us in person.

As a reminder, every time you order a dinner to go you are eligible to enter our drawing. Just drop a card in our drawing jar (a business card works or fill out one of the cards that we have right here) and, at the end of the month, we'll pull one card which will be good for two free dinners-to-go.

Maybe you'll win next month.

Order a lot? Enter a lot!
Good luck!!

Here is this week's menu:


Monday February 11 Brie and Almond-stuffed Chicken 10.25
Tuesday February 12 Shrimp, Scallop and Spinach Crepes 11.20
Wednesday February 13 Grilled Flank Steak with Balsamic Green Beans 11.50
Thursday February 14 Valentine’s Day Special (see below)
Friday February 15 Pub-style Fish and Chips 11.25

Our website
Special casserole of the week

We make a special casserole each week, usually on Wednesday. Order before noon and we'll have yours ready to pick up between 4:30 and 6:00 that very afternoon. (Yes, you can order in advance too.) Order a full for 9 portions or, if your gang is smaller, opt for the half-sized one, which serves 4 or so.

Say, we'll happily make a salad and provide bread for you if you like, just let us know when you call and we'll get you all set up.

Wednesday, February 13
Shrimp and Grits
Full: 39.75
Half: 19.75

Have a local beer with lunch



Sure thing!

We have wine by the glass and beer by the bottle. Your day might just call for a lunchtime sip. We keep a stock of a few of our favorites. Just ask and we'll point you in the right direction.

Lamb Kabobs

Oh so good. One of yesterday's possibilities. Nice!

Another new vase shape

I've been playing with making bigger things, trying to get more symmetry, smoother color, more pleasing shapes. Here's a look at one of last week's attempts. They're coming along...slowly but surely.

A Note From Laurey


February 10, 2008

G’morning.

I write to you from Seattle. I sit at the dining room table in Chris’s home right next to the Puget Sound. It’s a blustery day and the waves are breaking over the seawall right on the other side of her deck. The water is a dark dark green with a bit of dark blue. If I were in a little boat it would be a rough ride. As it is, I’m happy to be here, inside, watching, listening, writing. I can, to be thorough, see a little blue in the sky above the grey clouds. It might turn out to be a sunny day. Maybe. Maybe not. I don’t know the weather here well enough to say. Yesterday started like this and turned nice in the afternoon before closing in again, turning into a chilly, rainy night.

I’m here for the week, thinking about here and there, this and that, the turns and twists of days and weeks and months and life. Yesterday I went with Chris to her caucus session for the Presidential race. I’ve never been anywhere where they do this so it was a particularly interesting time. People signed in, wrote in their choices, and then spoke with conviction about why they had chosen their particular candidate. In the end, one person changed her mind, moving away from her original choice to the candidate that many of the attendees had already chosen. Democracy in action. Slow. Deliberate. Moving. It reminded me of the Town Meetings we had in my tiny town of Goshen in Vermont. A day spent hashing out how the town was going to allocate its money, electing the road commissioner, taking care of the town’s business. Yesterday was an exercise in people taking time to be with each other, to listen, to choose. It was a good thing to watch.

**

I have a new baby in my family. Bailey Kate Howard, Jones’s baby sister, was born at the very end of January. And even though you’d think I’d be able to figure it out, I have not been able to transfer any of the few photographs I have on my phone and in my e-mail onto this computer. So you’ll have to just believe me when I tell you that she is a tiny pip of a dreamboat. Beautiful. Head of straight dark hair (in contrast to her brother’s wisps of blonde, though exactly like her mother’s, so many years ago.). She’s a quiet one, they say, sleeping, eating, sleeping. That sort of thing. I’ll see her soon, will bring my camera, and will show you what I mean. Soon.

**

Yesterday we went to Chris’s brother’s house. He and Kathy, his partner, live a couple of blocks from the caucus place so we all gathered and walked over together. Kathy and Karl have made many trips to Mexico and they have decorated their Christmas tree with all kinds of little Mexican tin hearts. The three of them all talked about the caucus and poured over the plans for a new addition to their home. I sat and gazed at their little tree and its hearts and ribbons. What a sweet idea. Valentine’s Day is this Thursday, you know. Made me think of school and little boxes on each desk, decorated and ready for little paper valentines. We made them, signed them, gave them to each other. This morning I thought about that. Miss Jones in First Grade. Miss Hoadley in Second. Mrs. English and then, halfway through the year Miss Sweet. I guess I celebrated Valentine’s Day with her that year. Fourth Grade was Mrs. Center and by then I think we were a little less willing to give each other Valentines. In Miss Munger’s class I don’t think we did either. And certainly, by the time I was in Mr. Johnson’s class, those little boxes were a thing of the past. I kind of miss them. A Valentine for everyone. Why not?

Okey doke. Time to send this. I’ll be flying on Valentine’s Day this year. Don’t forget to tell the one you love that you do. This is your reminder, not that you need one. I’ll be in touch next week.

Tumbler attempts

These, believe it or not, are harder than the vases. You try to get a few pieces that a) are a similar height, b) have a similar thickness c) have colors that look good together...

All the while you make one piece at a time, putting each one away in a cooling oven after you make it - which means that you have to remember what you did! It's tricky that way - oh and fun too. Here's a "set" of sorts. Tra la.

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