Latke Party

Last Friday night, to celebrate the last night of Chanukah, we headed over to Rachel and Adam's apartment for a latkes-and-dreidel party. We met some new people, enjoyed delicious potato and potato-and-zucchini latkes, and played "aggressive" dreidel with fine Polish vodka and French candies.

Sides for the latkes included smoked salmon, herring, cucumber salad, and apple sauce. Quite a spread!

Lighting the Chanukah candles. As usual, there was some disagreement about whether to light left-to-right or vice versa. And as usual, left-to-right won out. I look on as Adam lights and Debbie sings.

Post-dinner dreidel fun with Fabien, Adam, and Adam's brother Josh.

Lizzie looks on with apprehension as Rachel manifests drunky-drunkness.

In our game, Lindt truffles were worth "3" and were highly coveted. The game broke down when people hoarded and then not-so-surreptitiously consumed all the truffles.

Thanks for having us over, Rachel and Adam!

The First Thanksgiving

The giving of thanks (can you spot ours?):

The sacrificial bird:

The cranberry sauce apple chutney:

The enormous vat of unbelievably good mac and cheese:

The deliciously over-filled dinner plate:

The post-dinner food-coma face:

Yum.

The Dinner Party

Last night, we had new friends Sara and Guillaume over for dinner. (Thanks, Robert, for introducing us!) As if the day hadn't already been taxing enough - Maggie took the GRE and I drank a lot of coffee while waiting for her to finish - we decided to whip together a four-course meal. By "whip together" I mean we had three hours to buy a bunch of ingredients and make everything before our guests arrived. It was a little intense.

Our menu ended up being slightly eclectic but all delicious:

Entrée - tortilla chips and home-made guacamole

Plat - Tacos! Chicken, white beans, home-made salsa and grated cheese on whole-wheat home-made tortillas

Salade - basically the same thing you see here

Fromages - Sara and Guillaume contributed three excellent soft cheeses to our multinational, multicultural meal

Dessert - my great-grandmother's famous banana cake (some day I'll post the recipe)

So - when are you coming for dinner?

Guess Where?

Our first social engagement this evening was drinks with senior Francophone music scholars from England. Then, we dined with some French-Canadian junior musicologists. That's a poor segue to this fun piece of Paris trivia: Where can you find the following statue, along with others representing different ethnicities/countries/stereotypes?

Nuit Blanche

If you're reading this before 7 AM Paris time on Sunday, October 4th, quick! Get on the 11 or 14 metro (open all night) and enjoy what's left of Nuit Blanche, an all-night party in the Parc de Buttes Chaumont, the Marais, and the Latin Quarter!

Maggie, Sandi, Jacob, Panda, and I saw the preparations for this nighttime celebration of contemporary art during our walk (or leap) in the Parc de Buttes Chaumont yesterday. This evening, Jacob, Panda, and our new friends Adam and Rachel (thanks for the hook-up, Talya!) enjoyed the fruit of all that labor on another long walk through the park. (Maggie, alas, had a babysitting gig across the courtyard, and couldn't make it.) The park was packed, and the art was awesome.

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After (sorry for the terrible photography)

Golden Slumbers Fill Your Eyes . . .