Cocktails
Dry Beefeater martinis straight up with green olives stuffed with blue cheese. The Landlady prefers hers “dirty” with a bit of olive juice while I prefer mine clean.

Appetizer
Baked endive. The leaves are lightly coated with olive oil. Walnut pieces go on the leaves which are then dusted with grated fresh Parmesan cheese. Baked until light brown.

Entree
Grilled marinated flank steak with grilled vegetable kabobs of onions, tomatoes, green & orange bell peppers and shrimp. Spaghetti with marinara sauce on the side.

Dessert
Vanilla ice cream with vanilla wafers.

My son and his girlfriend are visiting for the weekend so it seemed like a good reason to go crazy!

Hold the bleu cheese, please! LOL!

Ice cream later.

I saute onion, garlic and celery in butter, add herbs and white wine, and then shrimp and serve over spaghetti. Garlic bread is my downfall, but we're having that too. Salad is one my mom would make - canned asparagus spears on a bed of lettuce, with a sliced hard boiled egg on top, then a ribbon of mayonnaise mixed with lemon juice, then a sprinkle of paprika. Dessert is brownies with a Symphony candy bar mixed in, the kind with almonds and toffee, and I had some leftover chocolate buttercream in the freezer so used that. Wine is a German Silvaner, produced just a few kilometers from where I lived in Germany in the 70s. Too rich and extravagant, but it's my birthday supper.

Birthday dinner sounds delicious

Grilled chicken thighs, grilled corn on the cob with chili lime compound butter and home grown cucumber/tomato salad. Oh yeah and my 1st pickles of the season.