Where are you eating this Valentine's Day? Are you joining the crowds at the tables for two in your favorite restaurant? Or are you doing something special at home?
While appreciating a fine meal out as much as anyone, given our focus here we of course encourage you to try something new and creative at home. If you're cooking, what are you making? Any special plans? Or favorite comfort foods with stories attached?
After being hustled through a Valentine's Day dinner at a local "fancy" restaurant early in our relationship (mostly under pressure from another couple), my sweetie and I eschew Valentine's Day completely.
Who needs Hallmark to tell you when you need to celebrate a day of love? Please. Valentine's Day only make men feel more pressured and stressed out. Defeats the purpose, doesn't it?
The first valentine's day my boyfriend and I were together I had a chin full of stiches after an unfortunate ice-skating mishap. So we stayed in for Valentine's day. Now it is our tradition to stay in and cook together.
But I think that all the pink and red everywhere is pretty vile. I don't understand when even the coffee shops are pushing valentine's day stuff.
i'm making what i make every valentine's day: heart shaped meat loaf. it acknowledges the holiday, via the heart, while also commenting on it, a la everyday meatloaf.
the husband brings home the same thing every vd, the object of my young heart's desire (when that heart was very young): a heart shaped box of cheezy chocolates with a big cheesy red bow.
he likes the meatloaf, i like the box. win/win.
i once tried for an anatomically correct heart shaped meat loaf, but that didn't work out so well, now i go for the traditional. call me romantic.
Eating in but we're sharing the cooking. My husband is making fried oysters with meyer lemon aioli as a starter, which we'll have with champagne, then I'm making gnudi as a first course, and tournedos of pancetta-wrapped pork tenderloin with a fig-balsamic pan sauce and haricots verts as our main. We have a nice old vines Zinfandel to go with the pork. I'm not terribly skilled with the sweet stuff, but I'm going to attempt a batch of chocolate-lavender truffles for dessert.
We splurged and bought a black truffle, which I will shave over fresh pasta & eat with a bottle of Barolo. Every year we take our change to Coinstar and the amount we get is the amount I can spend on a bottle of Barolo.
As I do every year, I'm making cheese fondue, which we'll enjoy on our couch while watching Lost. Other that that, we completely ignore the day.
we're making dinner together. honestly though he will probably do most of the cooking. :-) he's a lot better at it than i am. but i will be making the chocolate creme brulee for dessert!
Her gave me a cooking class for Xmas so I will be making him a Thai dinner (hopefully). The aim is just some nice pad thai with shrimp and spicy coconut milk soup with chicken and straw mushrooms. I am still hunting for ingredients right now though so it might get put off until the weekend and we might get a pizza instead.
The last two valentine's days with my boyfriend (our only two thus far), I was sick with a bad winter cold. This year, if I manage to stay healthy for the next two days (fingers crossed), I'm making dinner. And hopefully it will be better than our last two Valentine's day meals of chicken noodle soup!
I'm not sure how this started, but my husband and I totally splurge on Valentine's Day with the oh-so-decadent dinner of Popeye's fried chicken and champagne. If you've never tried the combo, do so immediately. We skip gifts, although it's one of two holidays where he buys me flowers (instead of me buying them myself every week), and I bought him a small gag gift.
Although the fried chicken isn't exactly romance-inducing, the champagne makes up for it.
My fiance and I are going to be cooking at home on the day. Which is what we usually do, but this Saturday we are going to a new restaurant, so that will be fun, and hopefully minus all the over the top valentine's day stuff.
BC I love the sound of your decadent dinner of Popeye's chicken and champagne
we don't really do cards and gifts and all that but we will be cooking a meal together at home...so far it's seafood stew, an arugula salad, garlic bread and a good bottle of wine.
We don't do presents and rarely give cards, except to our parents. We're enjoying dinner at home for a change. I figure that since he caught the lobsters, I should cook them. Plus garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus. He isn't wild about champagne but I open a bottle anyway. I think I'm making individual chocolate souffles. Sounds luxurious but it's really inexpensive and quick.
Sometimes we cook, sometimes we go out. This year, we're going to a nice little French bistro here in Chicago, Red Rooster Wine Bar and Cafe. It shares the kitchen with its only slightly more formal big sister, Cafe Bernard. We had our wedding rehearsal dinner at Cafe Bernard and recently celebrated an anniversary there with family and friends. At the end of the meal, Bernard sent over another bottle of wine to the table, on the house. Not bad for a little neighborhood place!
We're going out tonight, instead of tomorrow, to avoid the hype!!
BC - I do love fried chicken and champagne, but even better, BBQ pork ribs and rose champagne. Insanely delicious.
we stay in and cook every year. this year's menu: lemony mushroom risotto, wilted spinach salad with bacon and oranges, and individual chocolate souffles.
Terry B:
oh! The Red Rooster! I adore that restaurant! And Bernard too!
but back on topic, no, not doing anything fun for the 14th. The bf & I live 7 hours apart, so we'll probably meet up in Cincinnati (long story) this weekend and eat something vaugely festive there. Going out for dinner, obvs, as it's nearly impossible to make his lovely poached salmon with cabernet sauce in a hotel room.
Our first Valentine's Day together, we stayed in and had pizza delivered. We kept that tradition going for a while, but a couple of years ago we started making the pizza ourselves. It's lovely. The idea is to keep it simple and cozy and to avoid all the dinner crowds and exorbitant prices.