Ratamacue Stew

It's been several months since my last posting. While I've eaten at several nice restaurants the in the past several months, nothing has been "blog worthy" until tonight. As we close out 2009 and enter 2010, Cindee and I decided to have a culinary night for New Year's Eve as we ring in the new year. We made several great dishes and I decided they were blog worthy enough to share (despite my comments in my previous blog about being a so-so cook - I won't use the term chef). All of the courses we prepared were very good and our approach to the dishes was interesting and fun. We took several recipes and combined the best parts into what we ended up serving. This is what I would consider the start to becoming a better cook. Taking ideas, merging them with your own, and coming up with a new dish that doesn't fit a recipe found in a book and can be called your own.

Here is our menu for the evening (oh how good it did taste, too!)

The appetizer is courtesy of a cookbook from one of our favorite restaurants in Ann Arbor called Eve. The main course and salad were combinations of recipes Cindee had from some of her cooking magazines. Dessert was plain old fashioned cherry pie.

Wines for the evening included:

2007 Rodney Strong Reserve Zinfandel
2006 Rodney Strong Reserve Syrah
The Black Chook Sparkling Shiraz

We wish everyone a Happy New Year and all the best for 2010!