St. Valentine's Day

Avram and I have never been too successful at Valentine's Day. Actually, life in general has never been to great for me and Valentine's Day. My freshman year at BYU I got pink eye on Valentine's Day, and so although I had a boyfriend, the day was quite romanticless. When Avram and I were engaged, I almost broke it off on Valentine's Day (story to come in due time in the saga). The next year I was nine months pregnant with Lydia and had a terrible cold on Valentine's Day. Although I had planned to make Avram a surprise cheesecake, the day ended up with me lying on the couch complaining loudly until Avram went and bought me lots of cold medicine, and I took it and conked out. The next year I actually can't remember at all. It's a large black hole in my memory. The next year, this last year, Avram and I tried to reverse our lame trend and he made me a scavenger hunt over the house, which was fun. But I still didn't do anything for him. I'm really lame.

So this year, I have been determined to change.

We're having a three couse dinner after Lydia and Elisheva go to sleep. I've written out fancy menus, and have place cards and candlesticks (although Lydia broke on candle in half yesterday. Grrr...). We're having a Mazza plate for the appetizer. That's middle eastern. We're having Hummous, Baba Ghanoush (a roasted eggplant yumminess, that I love forever), and to be really fancy Muhammara (all homemade. Everything is homemade with this meal; I am crazy). Oh, muhammara, how I love thee. Muhammara is a dip made of roasted red peppers, pomegranite molasses, walnuts (with some other ingredients), and it is the most amazing dip in the whole world. I would sell my first born for this dip. When I was in Syria they served it everywhere, and I still haven't recovered culinarily from the experience. I've never attempted to make it here, but I am currently making it as we speak. We'll eat all of this with homemade 100 % whole wheat pita bread and romaine spears. (I think I may make my own lebneh cheese as well, which is basically a cheese made from yoghurt.)

Then for the entree we'll be enjoying Moroccan Chicken over a bed of couscous with sultanas and almonds, along with roasted asparagus.

For dessert we'll have Pioneer woman's Chocolate Silk Pie (Avram can handle chocolate better when it's light, not dark and fudgy and moist and yummy. Since I like chocolate both ways, we're having it this way).

I've been salivating over this menu for days now. I love Mazza plates. So, that's our Valentine's Day. In sha' allah it will be the first romantical Valentine's Day we've ever had. Of course, now that I've written about it Lydia and Elisheva will probably sponaneously explode in the middle of our dinner, or something, but we try at least.