Bon Appetit!

Our Valentine's was superb yesterday. Jon took me to 26.2 (a marathon store) and had my stride and foot impact analyzed so I could get the right running shoe and then bought me a killer pair of shoes. What a great present! I call them my magic shoes because they're gold and they have this small gold detail that looks like something out of Lord of the Rings. Here's a picture:

I'm excited to get out there and see just how magical they are (come on...dream a little, people)!
So, in return, I slaved away in the kitchen all day. First, my friend came over and we made chocolate and caramel covered pretzels. It was messy but a lot of fun! They turned out to be quite delectable!

After cleaning up after that mess, I moved on to other things--like putting this little guy to bed. He looks beat, doesn't he? Maybe it's the crash after the sugar rush induced by the leftover chocolate and caramel drippings.

With my hands free, I finally moved on to dinner. You have to understand the situation first. February 13th is Jon's birthday so I attempted to make stuffed pork chops for dinner. They were horrible. Besides the case of trichinosis we picked up from eating raw pork, the stuffing was disgusting. We ended up microwaving the pork and scraping out all the salty, dry stuffing. You can understand now my slight hesitance in attempting another new recipe for Valentine's Day. I hadn't quite recovered from the embarrassment from the night before...or maybe I was just nauseated and tired (hey, aren't those symptoms of trichinosis?). I made a trip to the store for the ingredients and laughed as I walked into Smith's and nearly collided with a long line of men holding all the ridiculously marked up, half-dead carnations (all the roses were gone). You wanna know my opinion of flowers on Valentine's? FORGET THEM! They're so expected. I'd much rather get flowers on any random day of the week. That tells me my husband thinks about me even when it's not required! I'd much rather get a Diet Coke and Peanut M&Ms for my gift! Thanks, Honey-Babe!
So here is what I made for dinner:

This is a rib eye steak, pan-seared, over portabello mushrooms and topped with a red wine, garlic sauce. It got raving reviews! One even commented, "This is better than going to a five star restaurant!"
I hope you all had successful Valentine's Days. If you want to wow your spouse, go here and try this: http://www.gastronomyinc.com/recipes/steak_ny.htm.
The recipe is from the Market Street Grill.