Easy As Sunday Morning

I would like every Sunday to be like this. Easy. We wake up, enjoy the view, check out the Sunday paper to see what's interesting, enjoy the view, talk about our fun evening we had last night with friends, enjoy the view. Mt. Rainier was out this morning covered with snow, all white and majestic. No photo; I'm being too easy today. No big breakfast today, either, I'm still full from last night from eating at our new favorite neighborhood restaurant called La Rustica. (No website)

It is just a little hole-in-the-wall, unassuming place across from the beach

with about 20 tables and they take no reservations. Most the time there is a line waiting to get in. We got there early enough that we were immediately seated.

It's about as authentic of an Italian restaurant as you'll find around here. That pertains to both the food and the atmosphere.

We had heard about this place from 3 different sources and last night our friends, Sue and Mike, made sure we got there. It's not just a West Seattle place. People come from all over to eat here because it is so authentic. The menu is rather large with pretty much any Italian dish you can think of. Bruce and I got their specials; Boar with risotto and roasted vegetables which is popular on many authentic Italian restaurant menus

and lamb shanks which came with spaghetti and roasted vegetables.

Both were fall-off-the bone tender and just superb. The plates were such beautiful china, too. Each dinner came with a salad and bread sticks. I loved the bread sticks.

They were a soft, pull-apart kind and tasted like homemade bread. They were perfect for soaking up all the juices from our meat entrees. We even ordered a dessert, we couldn't resist. We had a lemon tiramisu which was utterly delicious!

We can't wait to go eat there again and try other items on their menu. Something as simple as a pizza with a bottle of wine would be perfect there, as well. We shall return! So, this morning it was just a light, easy breakfast. After a big dinner like last night, we felt like going for a walk in the neighborhood so we walked to church for the first time since we moved here.

We have walked past Holy Rosary Catholic Church many times and planned to go here eventually so today we finally did. The priest reminded us of Father Janovich from the movie Gran Torino, a young, round-faced fellow. The mass featured a children's choir who were very enjoyable to listen to and watch. When we walked out of mass and started heading to the Farmer's Market, it was raining and it soon turned into pouring rain. When it rains like that there's only one thing to do - head to Starbuck's.

Watching the rain outside and sipping on our coffee on an easy, Sunday morning - perfect.

The rain let up so we headed to Great Harvest bakery to buy some bread (and get our free sample.)

The rain had stopped by now so we walked through the Farmers Market and then made our way back home. I love having a nice, easy Sunday morning.

Meatloaf by Mark Bittman

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Spinach Stuffed Cod

Last night, I was in the mood for a healthy dinner so decided to experiment with a recipe I found from a blog called Creative in My Kitchen . Lauren and Ari brought us French cookies back from their trip to Paris and I basically inhaled them. They were so good! We were cat-sitting their two cats while they were gone. They liked lounging in the strangest places... I found one of their toys while I was cleaning so Lauren stopped by last night to pick it up on her way home from work. I was experimenting with this recipe which originally called for chicken breast but I thought it sounded good to substitute fish instead since I'm always looking for good fish recipes. We all thought it was totally delicious. When I went to the grocery store, they had Icelandic cod on sale so I bought about 2 pounds of that. You could use any white fish for this recipe such as: true cod or other cod rockfish halibut had

Sylvia's Scenario

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