Back Home and Together Again

Sunday March 30

Stefan and Andrea did not let up on their hospitality; though they had had very little sleep since last night's party, they got up (though Bruno slept in!) to make Barbara a full breakfast, including French toast, Canadian maple syrup, and meaty pork sausages, and get her out to her airport limo by 7:30. Thanks SO much, Andrea and Stefan, for your warmth and comfort and good cheer, not to mention all the excellent food!

Whenever Barbara would return from months away on her dig in Israel, we would have The Festival of Trayf. Ideally, not just pork, but pork in cream sauce topped with shrimp, then seethed in its mother's milk (and if you think finding shrimp milk is easy . . .). So, when Holt asked Barbara what she'd like on her first night back from the Great White North, eh, she said, "pork."

After picking Barbara up from the plane (and the floor), Holt served a celebratory reunion lunch: sparkling brut from our favorite maker, Gruen de Albuquerque; roast asparagus; Schad's ham; salami di Milano; artichoke hearts; Kalamata olives; and the pièce de resistance, Mike-sell's potato chips and Lipton onion-soup dip (see below for the sour cream) made with genuine, IGA Brand knock-off onion soup mix. He sure knows the way to Barbara's heart, and palate.

Dinner that night was pork saltimbocca. No cheese this time (though that would have violated one more law of kashrut), but thin slices of pork tenderloin sandwiched around Canadian prosciutto and fresh sage leaves, dipped in flour and fried, deglazing the pan with a little white wine for a sauce. Our side dish was thin-sliced and quick-sautéed onion and fennel, and a smooth Chardonnay, Indian Wells, from Chateau Ste.-Michelle in the Columbia River Valley of Washington state, helped it go down.