Grandson Tyler's Dinner at the Angus Barn

 My third and youngest grandson, Tyler, turned thirteen last week, and Dan and I finally got around last night to taking him out to a restaurant of his choice to celebrate his birthday.  Tyler chose the Angus Barn, without a doubt one of the finest restaurants in the Triangle. We liked his choice.

Tyler, my third grandson, is as tall as I am, and he's only thirteen.

It had been a long time since Dan and I had been to the Angus Barn, and Tyler had eaten there only once with his family and that was last year.

Rustic decor of the Angus Barn.

 The decor is very rustic and the food delicious.

Tyler perusing the menu.

 Tyler and I each had the 7 oz. filet mignon and it was more than I could eat.  Tyler seemed to have no trouble eating all of his.  Dan chose a NY Strip steak.

Filet mignon with baked sweet potato.

 A birthday pound cake that would feed six people was brought out at the end of the meal.  We were too full to have dessert, but Tyler took it home to share with the rest of his family.

Birthday Cake courtesy of the Angus Barn.

Happy Birthday Tyler!!!!

Grandson Erik and Indiegogo

Erik Farrell's one of a kind sgraffito plate.

Grandson Erik Farrell is attending Durham University in England working towards a Master’s degree in Conservation of Archaeological and Museum Objects.  In seeking assistance with expenses for his studies Erik signed up at Indigogo.

 Indiegogo is an international crowd funding site founded by Danae Ringelmann, Slava Rubin, and Eric Schell in 2008. Its headquarters are in San Francisco, California. As of 2012, it has hosted over 100,000 funding campaigns in areas such as music, charity, small business and film.

Erik is a talented potter and to raise money to help with his graduate studies he has made limited editions of pottery.

For $50.00 one can have a coffee mug made and decorated by Erik. Go to Indiegogo

Erik's limited edition coffee mug.

For $200. one can have a small sgraffito plate, approximately 6.5 inches in diameter, made and decorated by Erik.  Go to Indiegogo

Erik's limited edition small plate.

And for $750. one person can have a large sgraffito plate, approximately 14 inches in diameter, made and decorated by Erik.  Go to Indiegogo

Erik's limited edition large plate. 

To see these lovely limited editions of Erik's pottery, go to Indiegogo.

Or you can even assist Erik by donating $10. and you will receive a personal postcard from him.

As grandparents we are extremely proud of Erik, and I think if you visit this website, Indiegogo, you will see that Erik deserves help in pursuing his graduate degree.   And most of all you could become the proud owner of one of Erik's pieces of pottery.  I suspect these will be collectible one day.  

Capri Flavors, Morrisville, NC

When we were in Nova Scotia this summer, I made manicotti several times using a recipe I got from Lynn Zimmerman.  Back in NC I decided yesterday to make manicotti with yet another recipe I found in one of my new cookbooks.  After checking with several local grocers---Trader Joes, Whole Foods, Harris Teeter-- I could find no dry manicotti pasta.  After finding manicotti pasta in Sobeys in the small town of Port Hawkesbury, Nova Scotia, I was exasperated that here in a big city I could find no dry manicotti.  Do Raleighites not make stuffed manicotti from scratch?

And then I remembered the Italian food market over in nearby Morrisville,  CapriFlavors.  Costanzo and Titina Vuotto are the proprietors of CapriFlavors.

Costanzo and Titina Vuotto are the proprietors (Photo from their website.)

A really, really big jar of Nutella.

I scurried over and it was like being in Italy again---so many good Italian products. They even have the really big jar of Nutella that I saw in many stores in Italy.  I found lots of goodies in addition to the manicotti.

Lots of different cheeses.

Cookies and other sweets.

Titina teaches cooking classes, and I intend to sign up for one this fall.  I can't wait.

Titina in the kitchen. 

The next time I'm looking for ingredients for an Italian recipe, I will head right over to CapriFlavors.

Grace and Grandpat's Pizza From Scratch

Homemade pizza ready for the oven.

While the rest of the family went to the UNC-Virginia Tech Football game (UNC won--go Tarheels)  today, Grace and I stayed home and made a vegetarian pizza from scratch---crust included. I must admit this is the first time I have ever made pizza dough from scratch.

Here's the recipe we used for the pizza dough:
1 (1/4 ounce) package yeast
1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon olive oil
2.5 cups bread flour

Directions:
1.  Mix yeast in warm water until dissolved.
2.  Stir in oil and flour until it forms a dough ball.
3.  Cover bowl with a kitchen towel, place in a warm place.
4.  Let rise for 15 minutes.
5.  Punch down and wrap in Saran wrap and refrigerate for as much as 8 hours. We refrigerated for about an hour.
6.  Remove from fridge, warm up and let rise.
7.  Spread in pizza pan or on baking stone. We used a 12" pizza pan that we bought at Williams-Sonoma.
8.  Add favorite toppings.

This makes enough for 2-12" thin crusts.  I saved half of the dough to make another pizza (the dough will keep in the fridge for 3 days).

Grace spreads dough in the pizza pan.

Oiling your hands with a bit of olive oil makes spreading the dough easier.

We had earlier made our own tomato sauce using a can of diced tomatoes to which we added fresh basil and garlic.  We cooked this down until it became thick.

Spreading the tomato sauce.

For toppings we sauteed onions and mushrooms.

Mushrooms and onions provide topping.

 And of course we added cheese, in this case shredded cheddar.

Grace adds the shredded cheddar cheese.

Into the oven for 15 minutes at 475 degrees.

 We baked it in a preheated 475 degree oven for about 15 minutes until browned.

Bobby B was here so the three of us finished off the pizza (we did save one piece for Dan).  We were so eager to try the pizza that we forgot to take a photo of the finished product. It was a good pizza!!!  And we had fun making it.  

Shopping for Cotillion Dresses with Grace

The clerk shows Grace dresses of her size.

Eleven year old granddaughter, Grace, begins her Cotillion classes next week at the Carolina Country Club, and we went shopping for dresses the other afternoon.  Having never had a daughter, I'm lucky to do a lot of "girly" things with this one granddaughter of mine.  Grace had been shopping with her Mom earlier and had found a couple of dresses she liked and had bought her little white gloves.  But on Saturday she knew exactly where she wanted to go, Palm Avenue in Cameron Village where clothes for babies to women are sold.  They had a limited number of dresses in Grace's size, but they were all cute.

Palm Avenue in Cameron Village.

First she tried a black dress with white trim and matching black cropped sweater.

The first dress she tried.

I persuaded her to try a playful white dress with black cats.  A black sweater would complement this very well.  This was my favorite.

I liked this little dress with cats and a big black bow in front.

She finally tried a pink dress with a soft not shiny gold trim around the neck and sleeves with a matching cropped sweater.

Grace getting help with the dress of her choice.

She likes this one.

Her final choice.

I must admit, I've never really liked to "shop", but shopping with and for a granddaughter makes it a little more fun.  The next thing I know, she will be shopping for makeup.  Kids grow up too quickly these days.