Romaine salad with goat cheese, dried cranberries and trader joe pear champagne viniagarette
grilled asparagus
grilled salmon

Pardon the poor photograph but I grew up on this stuff. Mum makes it now every month or so because the rest of the world discovered lamb cutlets and the price went from $6/kg to $50/kg. They're wonderful crumbed and pan fried though. Those plates are my grandmothers that she bought in Harrods in the 1960s. No one else at the table was really into it, but I knocked off 7 of them.

Tonight was going to be ossobuco e risotto alla Milanese, but Mr. CE wasn't able to start cooking early enough so we pushed it until tomorrow and we got sushi delivered instead.

My Mom and Aunt are driving out next week for a few nights (before heading on to see other family). They'll be here a few months shy of my Mom's 80th birthday, so I'm trying to figure out a special early birthday dinner for her. We made a wonderful seafood chowder a few weeks ago, so I was thinking about doing that with fresh-baked bread and either a cake or Dutch baby pancake (a family fav) for dessert. My Aunt lived in Ethiopia for years and doesn't live in an area with an abundance of Ethiopian restaurants, so I always try to give her one Ethiopian meal when she's in town (and fortunately some of our favs are doing takeout). She's vegetarian/pescetarianish (but will eat anything she's offered -- a down-to-earth attitude after spending much of her career working and living in remote corners of the world that don't cater to special diets), so I'm brainstorming a few other meal ideas for their visit.

Really bad 1960s dinner. Hot dogs, Betty Crocker boxed potatoes and canned green beans. We had grilled some hot dogs over the weekend and didn't eat them all, so they were reheated. Partner likes those awful potatoes and is a believer in "There are no finer words in the English language than 'encased meats,' my friend." We use green beans as dog treats (Cody has packed on a few pounds) and I mistakenly bought a can of the French style. So, I decided to eat them since they're not easy to use for snacks like the regular cut beans are . All in all, pretty unsatisfying, but got rid of some crap. Partner said, "Tasty dinner!" (And he meant it!)

Would love to have your recipe for seafood chowder, if you willing. Either here or PM is fine Thank you.

Lobster or crab legs for the big birthday celebration .

Fusilli with parm & olive oil
meatballs
Fresh spaghetti and Rao’s sensitive marinara & parm
assd raw vegetables

waffle cone with Robbins peanut butter chocolate & Robbins rocky road
waffle cone with Robbins rocky road & Haagen Dasz chocolate
waffle cone with Trader Joe’s chocolate chip & Biscoff salted caramel

Your partner and I would get along well.

I like the crab legs idea. I have trouble finding good lobster in the Chicago area for some reason. We might search a few new places this weekend, as we're considering a surf and turf dinner treat on Saturday.

I don't have time to look for it right now, but it is an Ina recipe that is tomato based. It called for crab, scallops, and a meaty white fish.

My mother's grandfather was a lobsterman and she lives 10 mi from the Atlantic ocean. I would never dare to feed her either of those things in Chicago! She will only eat lobster if it came out of the ocean this morning, and loves Maryland blue crabs, which are not in season.

My Costco usually has both king crab legs and big lobster tails....both in the frozen and fresh areas.

We've never really found a good enough reason to shop there, and therefore don't have a membership. However, I believe my mother in law has a membership, so I'll have to keep this in mind.

how about sunset foods - I love their inventory.

I've only been to the one in Northbrook, one time. In fact, I went looking for lobster and didn't see anything other than the small frozen tails - same as I can get at Mariano's. It may just have been a bad day, but I was not impressed with their inventory -- although I was impressed with the deli there. I believe you may have been at the Highland Park store? I'm wondering if that one is better. I'll definitely give it a try one of these days.

Wow --expensive place.

The soft shell crabs at $8 each look tempting.

I'm sure I could make them keto with a dip in egg, followed by a crushed pork rind and Parmesan "breading". Might not taste too much like crab anymore though