Oh there are a number of things going on!

 It IS December, after all.

 

For starters, our signature holiday dinner is coming right up.

 

Join us, bring friends, and settle in for a warm night of wonderful food, favorite songs, and comfort.

 

The menu this year is all about comfort (and joy.)

 

Here's what we're serving:

 

Shrimp Tempura

With John’s Dunk Sauce

 

Bacon and Roasted Tomato Bites

With Basil Mayonnaise

 

Hot Spiced Apple Cider

 

The First Course:

Winter Squash Soup

With Crispy Shallots and Crème Fraiche

 

Crusty Baguettes with Butter

 

The Dinner:

 

Airline Breast of Chicken

With a Wild Mushroom Cream

 

Roasted Brussels Sprouts

With Garlic and Onions

 

Polenta Rounds with Yellow Branch Farmstead Cheese

 

The Dessert:

 

Molten Chocolate Cakes

With Vanilla Crème Anglaise

 

The price is $49.75 per person (+tax).

 

Please add 15.00 per person if you’d like to have wines with your dinner.

 

I hope you can come. It is so much nicer to share these dark nights having dinner and singing with friends.

This really is such a lovely spot for a party.  For those of you who come for breakfast (our french toast is getting raves these days amongst the "Twitter" gang) or lunch, what you might not realize is that we do private events here in the evenings.

 

The room glows, wraps guests in warmth and joy.  Musicians who play here on Thursdays say, often, that the room has a great "vibe." (More than a few have said that.)

 

And before we know it, it will be January!

 

You'll want to get this dinner on your calendar.  Tuesday, January 4th.  right here.  Ari, one of the founders of Zingerman's, the fabulous deli in Ann Arbor, is going to be in town!  We're going to have a special dinner featuring him and recipes from his new book:

 

 

Yes, friends, this will be a fun, delicious, bacon-filled dinner.  Starters, soup, main course, sides, breads and dessert will ALL have bacon in one form or another.  (My favorite!!!)

 

Here are our dinners for this coming week. 

 

Order by noon and we'll have your dinner ready to pick up by 3. We are open until 8 now which makes it easy for you to dawdle if you like.

 

 Monday December 6

* Cider Chicken with Cheddar Potato Gratin 12.25

 

 Tuesday December 7 Shrimp Ragout with Corn Cakes and Crème Fraiche 12.50

 Wednesday December 8

 

Brie and Almond Stuffed Chicken 12.25

 

 Thursday December 9*

* Pork Tenderloin with Butternut Squash Succotash 13.75

 

 Friday December 10

* Braised East Fork Lamb w/ Olives, Tomatoes + Rosemary 14.25

 

* these are gluten free

(though it is important to know that

We make a special casserole each week.

 

Order by noon or so. Order a half if you have around 4 folks. If you have a bigger group, or you just like leftovers, order a full-sized one.

 

Then come pick up between 3:00 and 8:00. (Or bring a gang and enjoy your dinner right here. We do have beer and wine by the glass, you know.)

 

The casserole this week is:

 

Wednesday, December 8

Mexican Beef and Pork Tamale Pie

Full: 55 Half: 27.50

 

And the Lasagna of the week is for Friday, December 10

Vegetable-filled Lasagna

Full: 38  Half: 16

 

Please order by phone (252-1500) or stop in to speak to one of us in person.

 

okay - here's something different.

 

I'm going to start a hands-on cooking class series.  There will be a limit of 10 students for this class.  We'll make a starter, a main course and a soup.  We might make a dessert too.  This will be using seasonal foods so think winter squash, apples, honey (which never goes out of season!)

 

The price for this class will be 45.00 (+tax).  You can have a glass of wine AFTER we're done using the knives!!!

 

Here's ANOTHER something for you.

 

We're making a good old comfort dinner to go.  It'll be ready for you on Friday, December 24th between 2 and 4 (which is when we'll close that night.)

 

Here's our menu:

 

At the start:

Traditional Shrimp Cocktail

with Spicy, homemade Cocktail Sauce

 

Julia Child's Beef Bourguignon, made with Hickory Nut Gap Beef

accompanied by

Elsie's Noodles with Sherry

 

Baby Green Beans with Toasted Almonds

 

Rosemary Yeasted Rolls

 

Sacher Torte

 

The price is a truly remarkable, old-fashioned 24.95 (+ tax).

 

The soup class on the 15th is sold out. (whee!)

We'll add a second class on December 22 if enough people (10) sign up.

 

The cost is 35.00 per person.  The class is a demonstration class. At the end you will get ample tastes of all the soups we make.  And yes, recipes are included, as is a glass of wine.

 

 

December 3, 2010

 

Hey there everyone.

 

It is beginning to feel a lot like Christmas. I’m at my desk and the café is abuzz with energy. Brendan made local lamb stew for our hot lunch. And he also made local meatball sub today. The place is filled with the warm chatter of happy customers, the aromas of all these wonderful foods and the promise of more to come. The world of Twitter rang constantly this morning, notes flying back and forth about our fabulous French toast. We have more than a few regulars who call, order and pick up our thick slices of this perfect breakfast – to go! (You DO know this is a great place for cooked-to-order breakfast, right?)

 

I have two cartons filled with newly-minted glass ornaments, the result of a day long session at the hot shop last week. When the café clears in a little while out I’ll display them in our windows. My tree at home is graced with them. And when I visit my sister in Kentucky I see years of crooked ornaments hanging in her windows, indelible reminders of my earlier (failed) attempts at symmetry. When I tell her that I’d like to get rid of them she absolutely refuses to let me touch them. She likes their wobbliness! Sigh. I keep giving her new, round ones, hoping the wobblies get covered up.

 

The calendar is filling up. It happens later when the news is filled with doom and gloom. Sometimes those dire reports are so dismal they feel like cement blocks hanging around one’s neck. But there is also no denying that our lives are, indeed good ones, full ones, hopeful ones. A look at our wall calendar, filling steadily with party orders, convinces me that, hard as it may be to stand up in the face of the doomsters, joy can actually prevail.

 

Tomorrow my little great niece and nephew come with their mother, my niece, and their grandmother, my sister, for the weekend. We had originally planned to go to New York for the weekend but, on closer examination, it made much more sense to just stay home. I mean, Asheville is the top of everyone’s lists, so why not have them visit me and do all the local things! We’re going to the children’s museum, the dinosaur museum, the gingerbread exhibit. The little ones, just 2 and 4 years old, still take naps (hooray!) so we’ll do that too. I think we’re going to decorate a tree for my little cabin. Filling my home with the fragrant boughs will remind me, in case I forget, that things are still good, relentless as the outside words can be.

 

And then we’ll be one week closer to Christmas and the New Year. As you see by taking a look at this week’s newsletter, we’ve got a lot going on here. And I didn’t even have room to remind you about Jenna Lindbo who is playing here on December 9th from 6-8. We also, for the first time ever, are hosting a photography show. Micah McKenzie’s eye is striking, as are his photographs. Do stop by, if you will. Take a look.

 

And, in case I forgot to tell you, thank you for bringing your sweet selves here, adding your unique personalities to our space. We consider many of you to be our family. We see so many of you on such a regular basis. We could not be without you, you know. So thank you for coming back again and again. It means a whole lot to me.

 

Monsieur Henri is newly fascinated with all things having to do with fire engines.  There is a fire station down the street from his house and he and Adam or Emily go there almost every day.  The fire fighters make the fire truck lights flash and, if Henry is lucky, raise the ladder.  The siren is way too strong for little ears, so they leave that off.