Saturday Theater benefit, Sunday Mother’s Day

Looks like last year, I wrote about Mother’s Day on the Monday after, so I guess I might as well continue the tradition.

And, I’d like to take a little farther back look into the weekend’s activities. On Saturday, I hosted a benefit for Forward Theater, kind of a progressive dinner, starting at my house, and then moving down to Overture Center downtown. It was fun. I put out a spread of upscale movie-themed snacks:

• mini pizzas, asparagus (fresh from that morning’s Farmers Market) and goat cheese, fresh tomato and fresh mozzarella, and caramelized onions and $9 worth of morels, also fresh from the Farmers Market, no cheese for the lactose-intolerant guest;
• Nachos, on home made corn chips, corn tortillas brushed with oil, cut in quarters, and baked, which made a nice-sized chip for individual nachos. The topping was a mixture of hamburger meat and the co-op’s chorizo, with a little added red chile powder and tomato paste. Most of them had cheese, but I left a few cheese-less, to be dairy free, and then when they came out of the oven, the cheesey ones got a small dollop or sour cream, and the no-cheese got guac;
• Fruit kebabs, with good grapes and kiwi and strawberries and blackberries, and kind of sub-standard melon – not ripe yet;
• Chile lime cashews and chex mix – that I always make with fresh garlic and Worcestershire and sometimes soy sauce, no seasoned salt or garlic powder, and I usually use real butter, but tried olive oil this time. I kind of miss the buttery taste.
• caramel corn and pretzel bars – it’s a Martha recipe, that I like because it’s a gourmet/junk food thing. You make a real caramel sauce with caramelized sugar and cream, and then you add marshmallows
• Truffled popcorn, like at Graze – popcorn with truffle oil, a little butter, and grated cheese.

The we proceeded to Overture – we had a little trouble finding the event, which was primarily a silent auction, with a dessert buffet, followed by  a bit of performance. There was a nice array of chocolates, and a macaroon bar, and some slices of whole desserts like cheesecake and tiramisu. They called the show vaudeville, but I’d call it a variety show, that was actually quite well done, especially the George Burns & Gracie Allen duo, and the segment with Groucho Marx from Duck Soup Cinema. The funny part was that two people from our group got really lost and ended up going in and watching the 2nd half of the Children’s Theater of Madison production of To Kill A Mockingbird. They said they kept wondering where the heck the dessert was – and it also proves what we’ve always said – you can get into any production in Madison, music theater, whatever – at intermission because they never check tickets again.

So that was Saturday.

On Mother’s Day, for brunch I made assemble your own egg sandwiches. I made a big flat omelet topped with cheddar cheese. We had lots of store bread – choice of ancient grains from Whole Foods, or Stella’s hot spicy cheesy bread from the Farmers Market, or sliced whole wheat, or English muffins. I made bacon and the last three breakfast sausage links, and rhubarb muffins, and fried up a sweet potato with ramps & chives. Then was totally lazy for the rest of the day – didn’t go for a walk or a bike ride, didn’t get my knives sharpened, didn’t do much of anything except a little laundry, and watch Game of Thrones. Didn’t eat dinner either, but still ate too much of leftover snack food from Saturday, chex mix, and the popcorn bars, and Trader Schmoe’s peanut butter cups and fruit jellies. Oh, well, it was a day to self-indulge.

Didn’t take pictures of anything either, except flowers.