eggs - they're of the devil

Hippety, hoppety... I still say, there's something wrong to the core about it being cold on Easter. As Sassy and I got ready for church this morning, the challenge was how does one manage to look somewhat spring-ish when it is freeeeeezing outside? I think we managed to come out somewhere appropriate, although there were quite a few ladies at church this morning who seemed to have insisited upon that springtime dress they just had to have or even open-toed shoes (my toes are cringing now just at the memory, as they're roasting nicely inside their warm fuzzy slipper socks).


Me? Play Martha? 'Cause unbleached flour on the nose is so in...
Our brunch today went off without a hitch, even without the superb contribution of the DG in her element (in front of the stove). Perhaps that's what gave Sassy and I the chance to shine. It's been a weekend focused on today's event. Friday we made a serious run to the grocery store to stock up on supplies. Yes, we stayed in to prepare - that's how committed we were. Saturday we were both doing as much prep work in advance as possible. I kept on rolling, even making chicken paprikash for lunch. Way to put that Hungarian sweet paprika to use. I joke that I don't cook. That's exactly the truth... it's not that I can't cook, it's that I don't cook. Yes, there is a difference. Agreed?

Favorite quotation of the weekend though has to come from Sassy's mom. When she called to get some more of that mom wisdom about how to approach something related to cooking, her mom said something to the effect of most of cooking is just about using common sense. Haha. We thought that was funny. Did that mean we were lacking that when we were stumped from time to time? We knew that wasn't the intended meaning, but we were amused just the same.

We have a running joke though about having to serve deviled eggs. See, Sassy has this fabulous deviled egg dish. Who has a dish like this? I tell you, they must be an endangered species. I may have shared this before, but if so, it warrants a repeat. It has an interchangeable center, where you can opt for a turkey (Thanksgiving), bell (Christmas), chicken (hmmm lame catch-all?), or - you got it - a bunny. I am very anti-egg, which made planning brunch contributions interesting, seeing as eggs serve as quite the foundation for many a brunch dish. Sassy and I worked alongside one another, but I'll admit I didn't fight her when she offered to clean up the sink when it was covered with egg "guts". Ewwww. No thanks.


Bring on the brunch...
The line-up was quite impressive, if I do say so myself. We had Sassy's contributions: ham strada, potatoes (with sour cream, onions, and cheese), carrot cake, and of course those wooooonderful deviled eggs. I made baked pineapple, grape salad, cheese grits (don't diss 'em until you've tried 'em!), and fried up some turkey bacon. WT brought the OJ and champagne for mimosas. D brought a fabulous macaroni casserole and MsH brought a fabulous fruit salad with Cool Whip. It was enough food for an army! If you could only see our fridge. We had to clean house to make room for the prep process. We were so excited to get it back to normal, and now it's instead full of leftovers (only halfway complaining - it's quite good stuff). There's absolutely no way we're going to go through all the leftovers though. Anyone want some cheese grits? We can give you some, along with a bag of Funyuns and some Slim Jims left over from our White Trash party. You see, we're just such kind and giving folks.

The brunch though was great. We wanted to keep it much smaller than our recent soirees and it was nice to be able to really catch up with friends on Easter. We were saying that holidays make it more obvious to us (and most of our friends) who aren't from around here and that for us, times like this and many times in general our friends really are our surrogate family. It was great to get together and chat and even share some really funny stories... from MsH's family story (deli meat?) to DrP's white trash tutorial to my interesting story of meeting the guy my friends now refer to as "mugging guy"... never a dull moment with this crew. Good times with great friends. And from the reviews, sounds like we'll have some repeat attendees if we should make this a regular occurance. Perhaps next time around our third roomie will be in the District to lead the charge!

For now though, Sassy and I have totally vegged out for the rest of the day. We're wiped. We were chatting sitting on my bed and realized there were no lights on and the sun had completely set. Oooops. Desk lamp is now on, although it will be switched off soon and very soon.