Easter Dinner

I expected that we would go up to my mother-in-law's for Easter dinner, but as it turned out she was going away for the weekend so I wound up doing dinner here.  I made deviled eggs (no recipe, though I looked at a few), asparagus (sauteed in butter), pot barley, and a half shoulder of lamb with this marinade.  I also threw in a few baked potatoes, because it's not a real dinner in Ireland if you don't have potatoes. I cooked them according to the directions on How to Bake a Potato.com. Amazing, the things that have their own websites. I found the results excellent. The lamb also came out well despite the fact that I didn't start marinating it until an hour before baking, and didn't have a food processor so the ingredients weren't as mashed up as they're supposed to be.  

When my mother was here for a visit, we went out to more fancy restaurants than usual, including Sheridan's, which is just on the corner. There, my mother ordered something that involved rabbit and barley. I had a taste of it, which inspired me to pick up some barley at the health food store last week.  It takes half of forever to cook (close to an hour) but it's got a nice chewy texture and tastes really nice.  It's my new favorite grain.  I wonder why it ever fell out of favor -- it's one of those ancient grains that used to be a staple crop but now is relegated to hippies, foodies, and animal fodder. People are really missing out.  Barley is great.

For desert we had carrot cake, and although I'm thrilled with the cake part of this recipe, I'm still in search of the perfect cream cheese frosting.   The one that in the recipe is too runny, as was the one I tried yesterday.  

Yesterday felt like a holiday, completely un-rushed and relaxing.  Dinner was the only real event of the day, apart from a mini easter egg hunt on the deck, and cooking it was practically stress-free.  

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