Date Night Dinners - Appetizer Night
This week we have gone from celebration to celebration, and we still have more to come with Independence Day celebrations throughout the day and even the weekend (omg I may pop). On Sunday I had my graduation party and my family and friends came out to celebrate with me. Besides being super thrilled to see and talk with everyone who showed up, we were able to enjoy a feast.
My parents decided to get the party catered by Beefalo Bob's so we had a barbecue of hotdogs, hamburgers, and chicken and veggie kabobs accompanied with sides of corn on the cob, potato salad, pasta salad, baked beans and corn bread. And don't forget about the appetizer and desserts. Lauren and I set up an awesome salsa bar including six different types of salsa and guac along with three types of chips (and yes I did make the description cards...remember to hit me up on tringeldesign.com if you like my work). And for dessert we had a plethora of cupcakes from Touche Touchet, a miniature dessert tray from SugarBakers for those who didn't like cupcakes, and best of all a fabulous cookie cake homemade and decorated just for me by the infamous Lauren. Her cookie cakes are seriously the bomb, they taste delicious and always look amazing; she is truly talented.
We have been living on leftovers since my party, and have almost finished what we didn't give to grassroots...just in time to celebrate some more. Brenden turned 25 yesterday and I had a fun birthday night/present planned. Although his birthday fell on our Thursday night date night dinner, I decided to push ahead with my plan and take him out for a surprise dinner at Medieval Times. Since I hadn't upgraded us to the birthday pack I decided to take him out for an early birthday cupcake of his choice (again at Touche Touchet…because we didn't get enough sugar on Sunday). He chose a chocolate raspberry cupcake, which he thoroughly enjoyed, and I tried a pretty tasty chocolate peanut butter cookie.
Now when you go to Medieval Times, they tell you to get there an hour early so you can mingle and pretty much spend more money buying drinks and souvenirs and tchotchke's (yes I taught Brenden this word last night). And while we enjoyed ourselves in our hour of roaming and drinking, I know us and I decided we should get or make a little snack to hold us over while we waited for our dinner and show.
This week we made date night into an appetizer affair. We had a few options, but of course in honor of Brenden's big day, went with the most carb filled one we could find. We made cheese stuffed garlic bread. Yum! Cheese, garlic, and bread, do I really need to say anything else to convince you to make this. Negative. But in case, for some crazy reason you are still not convinced, I will tell you a little bit more about this amazing concoction.
This bread was pretty simple to make, the hardest part was getting all of the ingredients stuffed into the cuts we made in the loaf of bread. But the whole thing is baked, which means everything melts, so even if you can't stuff the cheese and garlic onion filling into the bread as much as you want, it will inevitably drip down to fill ever crevice with gooey goodness. Thus, every bite has garlic and cheese and goodness. There is no bad piece of this bread, honestly. I could have eaten the whole loaf as my dinner. But, be warned, this bread is very gluttonous, and while I want to make it again, it should probably only be prepared on special occasions…I need to limit myself somehow.
Fortunately I knew there was a feast coming so I was able to control my intake of bread and butter (did I mention the recipe called for caramelized onions, that makes it healthy right?!). So, with our belly's happily filled with a not so fancy but totally indulgent appetizer we headed off to watch the jousting and eat chicken with our hands.
Recipe adapted from householdartsandscience.wordpress.com, Bloomin' Onion Bread
- 1 unsliced loaf of sour dough bread
- 6 Tbsp butter
- 1 onion, sliced thinly
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 6 oz sharp cheddar cheese, thinly sliced
- 6 oz monterey jack cheese, thinly sliced
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees
- Cut the bread lengthwise and then widthwise about 3/4 of the way down. Make sure not to cut through the bottom of the crust.
- In a large skillet over medium heat, heat the butter and add the onion and garlic.
- Stir occasionally until onions are caramelized, about 20 minutes.
- Place the bread on a very large sheet of foil on a baking tray.
- Insert cheese slices between each cut.
- Drizzle butter and onion mixture over the bread and into each cut. It may help to pour this mixture into the slices with a small spoon.
- Wrap excess foil completely around stuffed bread.
- Bake for 15 minutes.
- Unwrap the brad and back for 10 more minutes, or until cheese is melted.
- Remove from oven, pull off a piece of bread and enjoy.
0 comments: