August 25, 2015 Birthday Dinner for Suzette Grilled Filet Mignon, steamed sugar snap peas, Sautéed potatoes, mushrooms, onions and garlic

August 25, 2015 Birthday Dinner for Suzette  Grilled Filet Mignon, steamed sugar snap peas, Sautéed potatoes, mushrooms, onions and garlic.

I went to Costco for lunch (a hot dog) and to buy some food.  I saw Mimi Montgomery and invited her to dinner.  She said she was having dinner with her friend, Larry Kay, and would check with him.  We were  standing in the meat department and I saw lovely filets, so I picked a package with four nice filets and told Mimi, “We will grill these.”  Mimi said she would call me later to confirm. 

I then picked a 2 lb. bag of sugar snap peas,a blur cheese and a goat cheese and a bouquet of yellow roses for Suzette.

Mimi called later to confirm that she and Larry could come to dinner at 7:15 and they would bring mango sorbet.

I went home and at 6:00 we began washing dishes and preparing dinner.  I chopped about ¼ cup of onion, three or four cloves of garlic, five brown crimini mushrooms, and four Yukon Gold potatoes.  I also fetched a bottle  of 2008 Hafner Vineyard’s Cabernet Sauvignon from Alexander Valley that Cliff and Nancy had given us for Christmas several years ago.  I also stripped the strings off the edges of 1 ½ cups of sugar snap peas and went the garden and picked stalks of thyme and tarragon and plucked their leaves and added them to the mushrooms.. Suzette added some water to a pyrex bowl filled with diced potatoes and cooked them.  Then Suzette sautéed the onion potatoes and garlic and then added the mushrooms and thyme and tarragon. 

At 7:00 Suzette opened the wine to let it breath.

Mimi and Larry arrived a bit later with a container of butter pecan gelato and a Hagen Daz Mango sorbet.  Suzette heated the grill and turned on the Bayou cooker.  She grilled the steaks and sautéed the potatoes, mushrooms, onions, garlic, and herbs, while I heated the sugar snap peas for a bit more than a minute so they would still retain their crispness and flavor. When Suzette brought in the steaks I sliced them and they were a slightly bloody medium rare. I fetched the Béarnaise sauce and we plated the plates.  The meat was incredibly tender and the wine was fabulous. The sugar snap peas were crisp and sweet, at the height of their flavor and stole the show as best ingredient.

We enjoyed talking with Mimi and Larry.  Larry is also a lawyer and a serious long distance bicycle rider.  

We sat in the gazebo and after dinner ate the gelato and sorbet and sipped cognac

By 10:00 we said goodnight.  

Suzette said she did not like having to cook on her birthday.  I responded that I was able to make a better dinner than we could find anywhere for a cost for the entire meal that was less than the same meal for one of us if we had gone out to dinner and ate a better dinner.  She agreed that we would not have found such a good meal in Albuquerque and if we did we would not have wanted to pay for it.  We play this game after a good meal, by which we try to set the cost of the meal taking into account the dishes, the quality of ingredients and wine. Suzette estimated the dinner at $50 for each person’s Filet Mignon dinner and $100.00 for the 2008 Hafner Cabernet. Her final analysis was, “We would never have paid for such a wonderful meal?”  Meaning $300 for dinner for Four was too extravagant, even for a BD.  And we got to share it with friends we had not seen for a long time.  By my reasoning having to cook a bit was a small inconvenience given the result and the enjoyable evening and dinner.

Bon Appetit