Giada would have been proud

We spent the afternoon in Berkeley on Solano Avenue, which was absolutely fabulous. Except for the parking nightmare, I fell in love with the area. Jim has been raving about Zachary’s for several weeks now, so we finally carved out the time to go. He went a couple of times years and years ago. Anyway, it’s a Chicago-style pizza parlor. However, we didn’t have 40 minutes to wait for a deep-dish pizza, so we went with a couple of regular veggie slices, since they sell them during the day by the slice. Although I was a bit hard pressed to find the toppings, the pizza was amazing. The crust was very light and crisp, and not the least bit chewy. The bottom was liberally dusted with cornmeal, which added to the crunch. What I especially liked was that even though it was crispy, it didn’t tear up the roof of my mouth, which is pretty unusual for crunchy pizza. The sauce was very flavorful and had a slightly chunky texture that made it seem completely homemade instead of the whole processed pizza chain deal. I couldn’t believe how packed the place was at 2 pm. Even when we left after 2:30, people were still trickling in for lunch. I definitely want to come back for the deep-dish stuff.

Afterwards, we stumbled into an Italian market—I was in absolute heaven looking at everything. I finally saw all of the stuff that Giada talks about on Everyday Italian. I ended up buying some dried porcini mushrooms, a couple of tubes of tomato paste (the most exciting buy since I’ve been looking for that since I saw Giada and Ina use them), and some “bruschetta” ciabatta, which was basically half a loaf of ciabatta slathered with basil, garlic, and other such herbs. While we were in there, they offered us some samples. Jim tried a piece of salami and smoked proscuitto wrapped in a slice of Asiago. I got a lentil salad tossed with olive oil, basil, and other yummy things and the Asiago sans pig. Jim actually liked the proscuitto/cheese combo, which I consider pretty amazing, since he doesn’t like cold cheese.

I don’t know how this happened, but dinner was yet another crab feed! This time we were in Fairfield at the Civic Center supporting the Kiwanis club. JMC bought our tickets, and the other attorneys from his office were there, which was nice. I truly did not care to go, since I abhor the things, but it was for the greater good--schmoozing. He called Friday night asking me what we were doing, and since we had no real plans, I didn't have a valid excuse. I did say I was a vegetarian, and his response was, "I don't care what you eat! I didn't ask you that. I asked if you wanted to go to a crab feed." He really is a funny guy.

I had the usual—pasta, salad, and bread. The bread was cold and pretty gross. I was horrified to dig into my salad and see tiny shrimps floating around in there. I had requested a bowl of plain salad and added some of the dressed stuff being passed around, but the mass distributed stuff had shrimp tossed in it. It was not very appealing to say the least, and Jim was forced to dig through my salad and pick the buggers out. Jim was very happy to eat crab and watch the Patriots/Jaguars playoff game (go Pats!). I was not too pleased to see that the crabs were in huge chunks. It seemed to me that all they did was hack them in half, which was pretty gross. Luckily this place had higher ceilings and more space, so the smell didn’t really get to me. We had seats that gave us a view of the TV, so I had a nice distraction. The guy sitting across from me had crab guts all over himself, and since he decided not to wear his bib, well, you can guess how nasty he looked. I was absolutely thrilled to eat the pasta, which wasn’t overcooked and had homemade tomato sauce. It was really quite delicious.

Afterwards, Jim and MR had a guy’s night watching 28 Days Later. I was in the kitchen making lasagna, courtesy of Giada’s recipe from her first cookbook. It called for 15 noodles, which made an absolutely massive lasagna. I had made the béchamel sauce on Wednesday, which I was so proud of myself for doing. The last time I tried I used nonfat milk, and that did not work at all. The sauce was gummy and flavorless and sticky. This time I used whole milk and a touch of half and half (leftovers, yes) and it turned out fabulous. Anyway, I mixed the béchamel and jarred marinara (Classico) together for the sauce. It also called for frozen spinach, ground beef (I used 96% lean), ricotta, eggs, mozzarella, and parmesan. I assembled it all, somehow squeezing it into the recommended 9 x 13 dish. I really should have used an actual lasagna pan instead of a generic Le Creuset baking tray, but I don’t own a lasagna pan. Anyway, it will be baked off tomorrow, and I’m hoping it turns out. It was certainly a LOT more work making it a) in a large serving amount and b) with meat. I’ve always thought of lasagna as simple, quick, and easy, but it really wasn’t any of the above. It was my first time making it with meat, so that may have been the difference right there. Plus I’ve never made so much at once. Oh, and Giada layers it differently than I’ve always done. She put all of the ricotta on one layer topped with the spinach, then the beef, sauce and a bit of cheese for the second layer, and then sauce and cheese for the topping layer. I’m used to just dividing all of the filling stuff equally amongst the different layers. Who knows if it actually makes a difference. I’m looking forward to the reviews tomorrow. Jim’s younger sister is coming over for dinner, since their parents are out of town. I figure the ciabatta will go nicely, and even though Jim doesn’t eat salad, it might be nice to serve the lasagna with it anyway for his sister’s sake.