Compromising Situations

First by way of explanation: I have two other blogs. One is just a "what's going on in my world" blog; the other is my baking blog.  On my main blog, my husband is known as the Captain. (He likes that moniker. We had a houseboat... long story.)  On the baking blog I refer to him as Mr. Doughboy (he's not so thrilled with that one). Anyway, old habits die hard so more than likely whenever I refer to him here, I'll likely refer to him as the Captain (or Cap'n for short). Now you know. On to the main event:

So... Father's Day. The Captain gets to pick the menu. It's tradition. This year, however, it was a compromise. Yes, we still had killer grilled steaks (beef tenderloin to boot) and his favorite Orange Jello with Lemon pudding/Cool Whip topping salad. The Captain and the rest of the guests each had a baked yam bathed in cinnamon butter (think Ruby River's jacketed cinnamon yam). Yams are GROSS in my world so that wasn't even a temptation.  Here comes the compromise: I was able to throw in a few Karla-friendly items this time around.  Rather than a potato salad, I made a Savory Barley Salad that I saw yesterday while watching Chef Brad on KBYU. (Fresh green beans sauteed in Xagave and Balsamic vinegar, with barley pearls, cherry tomatoes, minced green onions and sliced almonds in a vinaigrette made of Xagave, flax oil and olive oil.)  We had a really good watermelon cut in cubes and sliced cucumbers and red peppers marinated in a bit of vinegar. Of course, for dessert he had to have Apple Crisp a la mode.

I prepared all the food and prayed that the barley salad was as good as it looked on TV because otherwise I knew I'd be diving head first into the Jell-O and the apple crisp.

I'm happy to say everyone enjoyed the meal... including me. For my Sunday food journal entry, I will be writing down: One 4-oz grilled beef tenderloin (the smallest one on the platter), Savory Barley & Green Bean Salad (I went back for seconds -- it ROCKED!), watermelon (lots and lots of watermelon) and, well, okay... one very small spoonful of apple crisp while I dished it up for everyone else.

In truth I wasn't even tempted. I had the spoonful to satisfy my curiosity about how it had turned out. It was good. Everyone liked it. Oddly enough, I didn't miss it.