The house:
Dad and Joanie relaxing in the living room:
Reed reading Roz Chast:
The dog loitering in the living room, trying to figure out where to stand so as to maximize the inconvenience level for the collected humans:
On Christmas Eve the longstanding tradition in Joanie's family is to cook "Seven Fishes": some sort of menu that involves seven distinct kinds of seafood or fish. This time around the dishes were five hors d'oeuvres: her ever-popular smoked trout spread, salmon mousse, smoked eels, a lovely curried shrimp thing, and a pie made from caramelized onions topped with bits of anchovy. All delicious! For the main meal she prepared broiled branzino and baked monkfish (also very tasty).
Photos:
Drinks before dinner:
There was quite a bit of music-playing as always:
Rustin was working furiously in his shop, this time around putting together a cool set of cutting boards made with a striped effect from different kind of wood. The shop:
Opening presents:
Bingo finally found someone who would give him some "lap time". I should add that when this photo was taking he was snoring loudly (I could hear him across the room):
On Christmas day Joanie let us cook brunch, so we made the traditional family Christmas morning meal (the one started by Paul and Frances): smoked salmon, dill, capers, cream cheese, scramble eggs, bacon, oranges+grapefruit, and (in our variant) fresh cinnamon rolls:
For dinner Joanie decided to cook a "Turducken" -- a huge undertaking, with complicated construction and a very long baking time. It turned out wonderfully this time, fabulously moist and very flavorful.
It was a nice visit -- no skiing or skating to be had unfortunately, but plenty of long walks and lots of "internet free" time.
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