Things are settling down...knock on wood

Things have changed a lot in the past few weeks. Jill and I are getting adjusted to the routine, which is making life a lot easier for us. It used to be that every day we’d come in to work and have no idea what was going to happen, but we’re starting to be able to predict and prepare much better. Jill had her first afternoon off last week, and today I worked for fewer than eight hours. I had the weird experience of not really knowing what to do with the rest of my day.

Another great change is that the café has been getting quite busy on the weekends! There was a very nice article about Generous Servings in the North Denver Tribune last week (read it here), and lots of people read it and came into the café to check us out. Hopefully they were impressed by our coffee and pastries, and charmed by the little spiral cookie (called tuile, pronounced “tweel”) we give with every drink (seriously, it would charm my socks off if someone gave me a free cookie with my coffee, especially if it was as cute as our tuile). Plus, there's Jill's latte art:

We hosted another fun private event on Monday, where the group made a menu including hand-rolled gnocchi and pear-cranberry bread pudding. On Saturday we had the first session of the “A Chicken in Every Pot” class, which was tons of fun. I even enjoyed doing the dishes after that class because I was so amused by the fact that we actually had cooked chicken in so many pots. I admit that sometimes I think of the class names before I think of the class content—in the case of the chicken class, I think the two thoughts came to me simultaneously. A class where we focus on creative ways to cook chicken! And a funny-sounding presidential campaign slogan! What could be better? Today I realized that I had missed a great opportunity to use the word “canoodling” in relation to a Valentine’s Day class. Ah well, next year. I am making homemade truffles in personalized chocolate boxes in honor of the Day, so if you’ve got someone to give one to, come in and pre-order yours now for pickup between February 10 and 14. Homemade truffles, in case you haven’t had one recently, are about three thousand times better than the packaged candies, and they’re best when they’re fresh, which they aren’t going to be unless you buy them from a shop that makes them on site. This picture is of our sample box, which has been sitting on the cafe counter for a week, so it's looking a bit ragged.

We’re trying some new types of classes in February and March, in response to requests and suggestions we’ve gotten. We’re offering one class for teens and adults to take together, and another for parents and kids. Plus, we’ve got a whole slew of new class topics on the schedule, from Indian food to herbs and spices to salads.

Jill and I have been working on our smoothie recipe, which we want to be able to make completely from scratch (no weird store-bought smoothie “bases” or powders, full of strange chemical-tasting gums, which is what most coffee shops use). We tested all kinds of thickeners for our smoothies, and we’ve finally developed a fantastic recipe. We tried making a vanilla smoothie (with no other flavors except our homemade vanilla syrup), which is not something either of us would ever order, and we agreed it was good enough that we’d like to have another one. So if it ever warms up here, we’ll be ready with a great lineup of warm-weather drinks.