Another Happy Birthday

I had another great birthday weekend! The best present of all was a visit from my lovely daughter Clara. She had Thursday off because of Yom Kippur and she doesn't have classes on Friday, so she had a 4 day weekend. We spent Friday together shopping for craft supplies and groceries.

Clara convinced me that we needed to have duck a l'orange for my birthday dinner. (She fell in love with duck when we went to Paris 6 years ago. The hoof and mouth panic was in full swing then and she wouldn't touch beef. I think she ate duck everyday that week . . .) Anyway, Long Island used to be the place for duckling, so we went in search of a duck. We found one at Skelly's farmstand in Aquabogue and roasted it to perfection. We also made wild rice from northern Wisconsin and a salad with some of the last tomatoes of the season.



Clara brought my birthday cake all the way from Mrs. London's Bakery in Saratoga Springs. (Mrs. London;s is owned by the same fellow who own's Max London's, where Clara, Barb and I had one of our best meals ever earlier this year.) It's called, I think, Chocolate Raspberry Supreme and is layers of chocolate mousse and raspberry glaze surrounded by molded dark chocolate. It's fabulous! (There's still some left . . .) Here's a photo of Clara and the cake:



Thanks to Clara and Pete for a lovely birthday, and to all my friends for the kind birthday wishes -- especially Paula -- who always knows when I need to talk to her.