Family Funnin and Foodin

This weekend marked the return of my sister to school at Utah State. She and my dad arrived after their cross-country drive from Maryland. We celebrated with dinner in Logan at the Beehive Grill. It was fairly good food, their special fry sauce was unique and delicious. I hear they have a rootbeer brewery, but we didn't sample. After an attempted barbeque with GPA and GMA, who had come down from Idaho to camp over the weekend, we returned to my sister's apartment discouraged: we had spent the last half hour driving around the campsite in the dark, looking for their camper. No luck.

It was not until the next day that we tried again. Saturday we ate and ate and ate. Episode 1. hotel breakfast; Dad apparently loves hotel eggs...why? No idea. I guess he likes the chewy, rubbery and runny feel of them in his mouth...? Gross. I like my eggs well done.

Episode 2. Kneaders. Hubby and I split the homemade pancakes. The girl at the register wrongly told us they were sourdough. They were buttermilk. Any pancake lover could have told the difference. And trust me, we are all pancake lovers. I do admit, these were pretty good for a restaurant pancake. Larger than the plate they come on, a grand 3 stack of hotcakes and caramel (pronounced car-mel) syrup (sir-up) not (care-a-mel sear-up) with whipped butter and strawberries (on the short side) was a cozy way to warm up in the crisp Logan air. Naturally, being fall in Utah, it was 90 degrees F by 11 am even though in the early morning, it was only about 60 and glorious.

Episode 3. Old Grist Mill apple puff pastries. We get these every time we drive to Logan. They are delicious. This time, ours were so fresh that the icing was still running down the sides! MMMMMM boy! That's good eatin.

Episode 4. Lunch. Grandpa and Grandma, who we did eventually find nestled away in the woods, had prepared a dutch oven feast. My Grandpa is quite the character; he owns every size dutch oven but two: the 11 inch and the 13 inch. What makes them different? You would have to ask him that. The straightest answer he gave me is that the odd sized ones are deeper and thicker than the average dutch oven. For this event, I think he used the 22 inch and the 20 inch, or somewhere thereabouts. We had ribs with homemade barbeque sauce, and green beans with bacon. The yellow jackets enjoyed the meal almost as much as we did: they love meat, and the smell of the sweet, meaty ribs drew in a whole colony to the point that J had to scamper off and eat by the fire pit. Uncle and aunt brought fresh veggies, mostly from their garden, and I brought our family favorite chocolate cake.

Episode 5. We drove home to Provo after a delightful, hours long, food and laughter filled luncheon and concluded that lunches in the woods are 100 times better than luncheons in restaurants, at least as far as family gatherings go. Dad and J munched on the amazing new bread recipe we created. (more to follow)

All in all, an awesome weekend.

If you need the recipe for this cake know this:  you can't have this recipe and eat it too. If you want it, you'll have to ask for it.  It's a SECRET :)