Happy Father's Day - Scrapple & Martinis

It’s 9:30 am on Father’s day. I’ve just finished eating my Father’s day breakfast of scrambled eggs and scrapple. I even added a little condensed milk to my eggs. And yes, I had scrapple. I truly believe that if there’s a God, the breakfast food He loves best is scrapple. Wikpedia describes scrapple as “a savory mush of pork scraps and trimmings combined with cornmeal and flour, often buckwheat flour. The mush is formed into a loaf, and slices of the scrapple are then fried before serving.” Scrapple is a unique, regional dish from Delaware, Pennsylvania, South Jersey, and Maryland. It’s yummy.

I’ve actually been up since 6 am. I’ve been dating this guy, Matt, and he came over last night for dinner and drinks. He loves lamb so I grilled some lamb for him and a boneless strip steak for me. I steamed some fresh asparagus and made some martinis. For those of you who know me, you know that I absolutely adore martinis and I am so thrilled to find a man who loves martinis as much as I do! Matt really likes my bloody hot martinis so we started the evening with those.

A bloody hot martini is a very easy drink to make and I am going to share it with you:
2 ozs. Absolute Peppar Vodka
1 oz. V8 or Tabasco Bloody Mary Mix
Lime wedge
Jalapeño-stuffed Olives

It’s really important to use an all-juice mixer like V8. Tabasco makes a 100% juice extra spicy bloody mary mix which helps to add an extra zing to this drink. This drink was originally made with Clamato but that contains high fructose corn syrup. HFCS is a sweetener found in almost everything and is arguably the worst thing you could ever put into your body. To make the perfect bloody hot martini, fill your shaker half-way with ice and add the vodka and mixer. Cover and shake vigorously for a good ten seconds. Rub the inside of a martini glass with the lime wedge. Discard. Skewer 2 - 3 jalapeño-stuffed olives onto an olive pick and place in glass. Pour drink over olives and enjoy. (Special Note: Skip the lime step if your martini glasses are chilled)

Anyway, we started the night off with dinner, bloody hot martinis, and good conversation at the dinner table. Matt’s a very interesting guy and quite different, physically, from the men I have dated in the past. I don’t mean that as a bad thing--he’s just different. What I find very interesting about Matt is that we have as many things in common with each other as there are things about us that are uniquely different. And I like that. I want a man who is enough like me that I don’t have to make too many changes and yet different enough that I don’t feel like I am dating a carbon copy of myself.

So we sat there chatting away and tossing down those tasty martinis. We enjoyed them so much that sometime during the evening we switched to chocolate martinis. (No recipe supplied) I view chocolate martinis with the same anticipation that a 6 year old does a frosty glass of milk and Hershey’s syrup. And I drink them just as fast, which may not have been a good thing considering how much I had already drank. So it should come as no surprise to you that it hit me, in mid-sip, that I had had way too much to drink.

Fortunately for me, Matt is a very understanding guy. He placed my drunk butt in bed and even cuddled up with me. While a little bit of alcohol can make me feel amorous, a lot of alcohol only makes me sleepy--very sleepy. The last thing I remembered was feeling drunkily warm and sexy cuddled up in Matt’s arms. (Is drunkily a word?) I woke up around 2 am and Matt was gone. Matt has sleep issues where he has his days and nights partially switched. I’m quite sure he went home and started cleaning his kitchen. I fell back to sleep and woke up at 6am where I got up, drank a lot of water, and walked the doggies.

So that’s how I started off my Father’s Day--slightly hung over eating scrambled eggs and scrapple. Later today, Matt is coming back over and we are grilling steaks with Heather and Aaron. But no martinis and not because I had too much last night. Inside my refrigerator is a wonderful Sangria, which has been marinating for the past two days. Mmmmm, Sangria! Ah, but that's another post!