catchin' up

Three cheers for my last weekend class in Rochester! Graduation is this Thursday!!
I'll be blogging more regularly once I'm done with school. In the mean time, here's what we've been up to.
May Dinner club was hosted by Kaija & Dean. We were in charge of the appetizer this month. Mikey had a work meeting and so we picked something that was "easy" for me to make.
I started by mashing these fennel seeds in to a powder (side note: I hate using a mortar & pestle almost as much as I hate stirring risotto for 30 minutes):
Next I chopped half of a red onion and gave them a quick rinse to take the edge off:
Meanwhile the goat cheese and cream cheese warmed to room temperature. Then, I added the zest of one lemon, chopped tarragon, salt, pepper and fennel:
After a bunch of whipping, I had a nice cheese spread. I cut up a baguette and brushed olive oil on both sides of the bread. The bread was baked at 375 for 5 minutes on each side.
Next I spread the cheese mixture on the bread and sprinkled on the red onions:
Next, I added some Coriander & Black Pepper Smoked Salmon from Northern Waters Smokehaus. The crostinis were garnished with lemon peel & tarragon sprigs:


The combination of the fennel, tarragon, coriander & lemon was fantastic with the salmon! Recipe can be found here.
Upon arrival, Bruce presented K&D with a bottle of Akvavit- a traditional Scandinavian liquor! After a "Skol" to toast the evening, we enjoyed a lovely CA Chardonnay that Nikki & Henry brought with the appetizer.

Kaija & Dean had a wonderful spread of food. The meal was inspired by their favorite Scandinavian cooking celebrity, Tina Nordstrom. Unfortunately I forgot to take pictures until after the meal so these are the leftovers.
Arugula salad with pears and prosciutto:
Smoked salmon, egg, potato & dill salad:
The entree was Lake Superior white fish with herb encrusted shrimp (no surprise... there were no leftovers to photo). It was so good and so fresh! We all enjoyed a couple Zinfandels (Marietta Old Vine & Sin Zin) that we brought as well as another bottle of Chard from K&D. K&D's house is so cozy and cute!
Nikki & Henry brought dessert. It included a whipped tofu and lemon "smoothie" that was topped with walnuts, blueberries and cinnamon. It was so light and so delicious!
Then we retired to to the living room to have coffee by the fire:
Cute and super cozy, huh?
We had tea, coffee and then a mini whiskey tasting.

It seems like we drank a lot but when you consider that there are 7-8 of us splitting a bottle of wine, there ends up being a lot of just tastings.
Even the kitty joined us! Dinner clubbers- help me out on the kitty's name, please.
Per usual, the couples photo shoot:
N&H:
Bruce & his "date" David (Nellie was working on a paper for school):
The gracious hosts, K&D:
We really enjoy dinner club!!

Now on to this past week...
I got to meet our new niece. I took Wednesday off of work and Mikey and I headed down to the cities to do a photo shoot with our new family member.

Sydnie May was born on April 15th so she is now 3 weeks old:
Such a doll:
Precious:
Snuggle bug:
I also got to meet Kristen & Jake's dog. Her name is Maya and she is really sweet:

Proud parents:
M&M:
It was also Homegrown Music week in Duluth-Superior this past week. So, it's been a good couple of weeks. The next post will be featuring my graduation. Hooray!