Long time, no blog

I know, it's been a long time, but there just hasn't been too much to blog about recently. I try not to write too many posts that say, "Everything is pretty much like it was last week." I also avoid the captain's-log posts: "Fair day, wind from the east. Played three games of whist." There's a certain type of event that makes for good blogging: it has to be sort of stupid but not so bad that it doesn't seem funny. Sometimes I wish this blog could be a more accurate record of this phase of my life, including the really hard things about running a business and the mistakes we make while trying to do it, but although I really don't mind telling almost anything to almost anyone in conversation, there are limits to what I want on the permanent written record. Especially since our lending bank checks this blog multiple times a day, which is a little creepy, don't you think? (And also inefficient, since I only post about once a week on average; although they haven't checked since March 5, so perhaps my strategy of not writing for a while is working.) I'm being stalked by a bank.

So anyway, the past couple of weeks have been fine. We've been busy, but not insanely busy. I taught our first Cooking with Kids class, featuring nine three- to six-year-olds and their parents, which was messy. The food was quite spectacular, given the circumstances: we made a great melon and grape salad with lime-cardamom dressing, mini quiche with bacon, monkey bread, and homemade granola-yogurt parfaits. Honestly, I'd make any of those recipes again for myself, they came out so well. Then I spent three hours sweeping granola out of every crevice of the kitchen.

We've done several private events, including one which we have decided was the most boring group of people we've ever met, all of which have been quite successful. At the last private event, we made some great dessert hors d'oeuvres, including individual tiramisu and bananas Foster in phyllo cups. I'm still playing with the best ways to make desserts in the amount of time we have available, and both of these recipes were winners. I've also started teaching a coconut milk-sticky rice dessert in my Asian-Inspired Meals classes that I really like. Mmmm, dessert.

Since I don't have any relevant pictures for this post, here's a random picture of some people in a private event playing with the pasta machine (which I call "Play-Doh for adults"):