redzils blew into town for a quick visit yesterday. She arrived a bit after noon, after calling for directions (I'd forgotten to warn her about the new 40 thing, so she ended up in Jamestown, going "WTF?"), and we sat around and chit chatted for a little while before heading out to Elizabeth's Pizza for lunch. She graciously tolerated running a couple of errands while we were out, including Petsmart. They were doing kitten adoptions yesterday. Talk about piles and piles of cute.After the errands, we got to the fun part of the afternoon: Edward McKay for used books, and the bead store. :) We came home and sat around and knitted and petted the beads, and got dinner going. Dinner was my new favorite roll recipe, lemon-pepper chicken (thaw chicken pieces. Mix several tablespoons lemon juice with a couple tablespoons corn starch. Add in some garlic powder, thyme, salt, and pepper. Brown chicken briefly in pan, then pour lemon stuff over top and cook until the chicken is done and the sauce is cooked down. Very lemony, very good. Next time, more pepper, and fresh garlic), my first attempt at risotto (How to Cook Everything recipe, minus the wine because we didn't have any [used more stock instead]. Verdict: Not nearly as hard as I thought it would be. Nice to have an extra set of hands around to stir while I messed with the chicken and rolls and got Jeff to make drinks. :) Nice foil for the tart chicken. A little bland. Better stock would have helped. More spices, too. Very tasty, though. And we have lots leftover - starting with 1.5 cups of rice was too much for 3 adults with other food on the table - so I have cheesy rice to eat for lunch all week. Oh. Darn.), and chocolate cake. (Verdict on the cake: very very good. Maybe not the "best ever" - we all agreed that we like our chocolate cake more fudgy than cake - but very very very good, and especially for a sheet cake, very good. Also, quick to put together. And you can make the icing in the microwave. Would definitely make again.)
Along with all the food, there were drink mixers from World Market - and vodka - so there was some tipsiness as well. (Verdict on the mixers: not bad, not worth getting again. Pomegranate better than lemon-raspberry). We ate, we talked, we knitted, we drank. We all eventually fell over into a haze of food and sleepiness around 10:30.
This morning, we had leftover rolls and eggs for breakfast, and then Zils had to get on the road to get home. So, it was a brief, but very good visit.