An Evening At Grill 23 With Brandt Beef And Burgess Wines

I was recently invited into Grill 23 & Bar for a special dinner to celebrate their partnership with the Brandt family. Grill 23 is part of the Himmel Hospitality group (along with Harvest and Post 390), and all the restaurants in the group serve Brandt Beef. The dinner featured, understandably (and I am not complaining!), a lot of beef, prepared by executive chef Jay Murray, as well as wines from Steve Burgess and Burgess Cellars.

Rum Cocktails And More At RumBa

We walked into RumBa, a rum and Champagne bar at the InterContinental Boston, to the sounds of a steel drum, which added to the Caribbean-themed atmosphere. This was all too welcome on a cold, gloomy Thursday evening. Add one of RumBa's signature cocktails and it was like we were instantly transported somewhere warm and tropical. My friend started out with a key lime cooler, a mixture of Cruzan Vanilla Rum, Licor 43, fresh lime juice, and pineapple juice. It was fresh and bright and definitely reminiscent of key lime pie. I was immediately drawn to the Pyrat Passion, which consisted of Pyrat XO Rum, passion fruit nectar, fresh lime juice, and coconut. It was cool, creamy, and heavy on passion fruit flavor.

Baked Brie With Toasted Almonds, Dried Cherries, And Mâche

I was recently flipping through cookbooks looking for some appetizer ideas and came across a recipe for mâche with warm Brie and apples in Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics, and I realized that it had been a very long time since I'd had mâche or made baked Brie. That was just the push I needed to add some baked Brie to the menu. Since the recipe was for a plated salad course and I wanted more of a shareable appetizer, I made some changes.

Skirt Steak Tacos With Mango Guacamole

I'm back with another great Cinco de Mayo worthy dish: steak tacos with mango guacamole. The National Mango Board recently sent me a box of mangos, and while I ended up eating most of them just cut up and mixed with strawberries, I did use one in a flavorful guacamole, which I put on top of some tasty grilled steak tacos.

Pork Carnitas Bites

Cinco de Mayo is coming up! If you're looking for a fun party recipe, you've come to the right place. I had been seeing pictures all over Pinterest of little taco cups, and while those sounded fun, they were a bit too simple for me. So I took them up a notch by making pork carnitas in the slow cooker and then crafting mini pork carnitas bites.