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I usually make a special dinner for NYE. Last year I made beef tenderloin stuffed with lobster and it tasted like ass. Actually more of a consistency issue, but anyway...

Do you have a favorite entree that you pull out for special occasions? Any suggestions would be welcome.

also, i would be curious for new year's day brunch ideas, cliche be damned!

something really decadent and romantic for nye
the boy and i are thinking of forgoing all the hoopla and just staying in, making something really incredible, and then settling into the couch for a long winter's night with some classic movies!

ps -- didn't cook a thing this weekend, buh, the folks were in town!

I’ve had a country ham sitting around the house for the past couple months (that’s ok, right?) and have yet to tackle it. Prepping these hams seems a little intimidating, but I plan on serving slices with a bunch of biscuits for a post-Christmas brunch. Does anyone have country ham experience?

i have no personal experience with country ham, but the latest issue of CHOW magazine has a wonderful story about them that includes cooking points
if you haven't seen CHOW yet, it is soooooooo worth hunting down
its kind of a cross between a stylish, modern lifestyle mag aimed at 20-30somethings and Saveur
its truly FAB!

country ham . . .
never done it myself, but read with amusement the Home Cooking board on Chowhound.com last week - click on my name for the link

someone had a ham from several years ago. the advice was to cut the mold off and boil it up for desalination.

Read "Pig Perfect" by Peter Kaminsky if you want exhaustive knowledge on the subject

I'm not sure what a country ham is, but Nigella Lawson has a FABulous recipe for Ham cooked in Coca Cola. you simmer the ham in a bottle of coke (not diet) with a quartered onion for an hour or so, and then you score the skin, pour treacle and mustard powder over it, with a clove stuck into each square and put it in a very hot oven to crispen up. she uses the coke liquid with black beans to make a kind of southern bean accompaniment and also suggests a sweetcorn souffle as an accompaniment. But the ham is really easy and very delicious - I've made it and it always impresses people for a new year's lunch...

here is the link to the recipe:

http://www.channel4.com/life/microsites/N/nigella/bites8.shtml

I'll check out the Chowhound thread (for some reason I rarely read the Home Cooking section).

I actually subscribe to CHOW--which reminds me that I don't think I received the current issue--or else I certainly didn't read it very thoroughly.