My New Personal Chef

[prosodic]

See this absolutely adorable man standing between Ruth and myself? I acquired him today as my new personal chef. Hehehe.

He's the owner of Cafe Madrid, one of our favorite restaurants. We went there today for tapas. As we were paying the bill, Ruth explained to him (he doesn't really speak English well, just German and Spanish) that I am moving back to the United States, and that I needed to find a good tapas place in Seattle.

He got very excited and said, "Can she take me with her?"

I said yes, but only if he cooked tapas for me everyday at home.

He agreed. Hehehe.

(I can just see it now...Lance walks into the kitchen one day and asks, "Honey, who the hell is this strange Spanish man cooking potatoes in our kitchen?")

We asked him to take photos, but before we left, he insisted on having one with the two of us. Christine was there too, but she wanted to take the photo, rather than be in it.

Our menu today:

- Meat and cheese platter (manchego and sheep's cheeses, Serrano ham, chorizo, olives)
- crusty bread with aioli
- shrimp in garlic oil
- small potatoes with sea salt and Mujo sauce (never quite figured out what that was)
- mushrooms in cream sauce
- bacon-wrapped dates (my favorite thing)

All of it was delicious, as always. We ordered off the menu this time. Usually he picks out tapas out for us, knowing what we like (always the bacon-wrapped dates) but also giving us new stuff to try, usually seafood, and not stuff that we cared to have again. So we wanted to be in charge of the menu today.

We followed this with a walk for a couple of blocks to a coffee/sandwich shop, where we each had two coffee drinks: a Latte Macchiato for me, followed by a chocolate espresso.

It's been a good day. :)

Oh, and Ruth told me today that there's a very good chance she'll be in Seattle in January for a couple of weeks. I'm so excited about this. She plans to take me to some of her very favorite places and really introduce me to the city.