Family Fun

Just like we expected, we had a blast last night with my family.  We gathered at Ben and Amber’s home in Perry.  Ben is the older of my brother’s two sons. They have two sons--Brayden will be four years old in a couple weeks and his little brother, Cole, will be two in April.

Chef Mike

Normally, Ben does the cooking when we’re at his house, but last night he assigned that task to his father.  Mike is an excellent cook.  He prefers the down home cooking of the south, so that’s what he prepared for us last night--meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and collard greens.  Everything was delicious, but oh my gosh, the greens were to die for.  For dessert, he crumbled some shortbread cookies and mixed them with a little butter to make a crust which he baked for a few minutes until it was firm.  Then he layered banana pudding and fresh bananas over the curst with a generous dollop of real whipped cream on top.

I took the poppers, but Ben just couldn’t stay out of the kitchen.  I was a little confused when he put a pork tenderloin on the grill since Mike had meatloaf in the oven.  That tenderloin turned into an appetizer.  He spread rounds of French baguette with melted butter and horseradish then ran them under the broiler until the bread was a golden brown.  Well, he actually left it a minute too long, but that’s what he intended to do.  On the hot bread he put a drop of spicy mustard, a tablespoon of freshly grated Parmesan cheese, a slice of tenderloin, and topped the whole thing with sauteed onions.  Ben’s the gourmet cook in the family and he’s very good at what he does.

We didn’t just eat and drink while we were there.  We played with Brayden and Cole outside for a while.  Brayden had been to a birthday party earlier in the day.  I guess kids have theme parties these days and the theme for this party was cowboys and cowgirls.  The kids all worn their western outfits.  At the party they got hats with plenty of stickers for decorating and of course there were ponies to ride.

Brayden’s birthday party is in a couple of weeks and he made it a point to tell us that his party was going to be at the Fire Station.  All the kids will get a tour of the station, get to shoot the water hose (I’m hoping they’ll be getting a whole lot of help from the fireman), and they get to crawl under the smoke from the smoke machine.  Brayden’s all excited about it and Amber says it’s part of the fire department public service activities and doesn’t cost anything.

Cole loves to play outside

Ben’s younger brother, Eric, was also there for dinner.  He had to work yesterday so wasn’t able to get there early.  His wife and daughter weren’t able to come because of a previous commitment.  Sorry we missed them, but we had a good visit with Eric.

We made the egg stand on end.

We’re gonna be doing it all again this evening, but tonight Ben is our chef.  He wouldn’t tell us what’s on the menu.

That’s it for today.  Thanks for tagging along.