Earth Day Cooking Club

Summer hosted cooking club this month. Yesterday was Earth Day, so we decided to celebrate the earth by making earthy dishes!

Yumi made a roasted asparagus and ramp tart. Isn't it gorgeous?



Valerie made a fiddlehead salad from fiddleheads she harvested in her own woods! Don't they look just like little caterpillars?



Baby Gabrielle joined us!



Valerie also brought some morels that were harvested on her land. What a lucky day!



Yumi played with Gabby as the morels sizzled.



Mmm, fried in butter!



Since Planet Earth has more water surface than land, Summer committed to grilling a hefty amount of seafood. And she grilled it on a Himalayan salt block! That's super earthy!



Swordfish and scallops sizzling on the salt block.



Valerie served her fiddleheads with potatoes and smoked salmon, and a dilly dressing. She kept them separated in case anyone was turned off by the fiddleheads. I'm the only one who finished them ALL!



Mmm, looking good!



Summer served her seafood from a platter, along with a minty mango salsa!



Up next she grilled some meaty shrimp and some more scallops. Finger to serve as proportion for how meaty those shrimp are!! Way bigger than a finger!



Nancy made a rainbow power kale salad with peanut dijon dressing!



I made Smitten Kitchen's mushroom lasagna. Talk about earthy! This was so mushroomy delicious.



Smile, cooking club ladies!



Mmm.



Emily made an earth trifle. With chocolate cake for "dirt" and chocolate rocks inside! A delicious caramelly whipped cream layered throughout.



Isn't that just amazing?! It tasted amazing too!

Cherry Blossoms with Dan, Elise, and Henry!

Ben and I went to the cherry blossom trees again this afternoon, this time to meet some very special guests! Cousin Dan was in town with Elise and Henry!



It was nice and warm. Perfect cherry blossom weather.



There were a lot of people there enjoying the blossoms.









Felix!






Elise, Henry, and Cousin Dan! I was so happy that they came for a visit. This was my first time meeting Henry! Dan had never been to the cherry blossoms before, so that was exciting.



Hi, Henry!



Henry was VERY energetic so Dan kept coming up with assignments for him. A popular one was "Go pick up sticks!"



When he started to get bored of that, we upgraded it to "build a little bridge on the tree out of the sticks!"



"Okay!"



Relaxing.



Brother and sister.

Happy Birthday, Ben!

Yesterday was Ben's birthday! Tonight the family gathered at Gran Ranchero for a birthday party! I spent the afternoon making a massive cake. This is about three quarters of the way done:



At one point, I took a break from making the cake to see if Felix, who was chilling in the backyard, might want to come inside. I opened the door to the breezeway to find him just sitting like this, patiently waiting for me to peek out and see if he felt like coming in. He is SO SWEET. This is how he always asks to be let in. He just sits there patiently, waiting for you to notice that he's ready.



The final layer! This is a chocolate cake with peanut butter cream cheese frosting, coated with chocolate-peanut butter ganache. The recipe is from Smitten Kitchen. I gave up trying to do the beautiful ganache drops and just smeared it all over. We planned to gather back at our house after dinner to have cake!



At Gran Ranchero! Dad and Ben!



Dad, me, and Ben with Amina and Aya.



Ben, Rachid, and the kids!






Group photo!



Cheryl and Aya.



Mom and dad dancing!






Dad asked Rod to come and play live music during the party. It was really special!






Mmm, quesadilla!



Back to our house for cake! Ben was REALLY EXCITED about his cake.



Make a wish!






Look at that massive cake! It was delicious.



Mmm! Happy birthday, Ben!

Cherry Trees!

Ben, Felix and I went to see the cherry trees this evening! They're really starting to bloom!









Felix and Ben.



Family!



Sunset.