WHAT'S FOR LINNER?

We went over to my brother's weekend house to have Christmas linner.  It was my immediate family, one of my cousin's family, and my sister-in-law's sister and her husband.  They had a massive assortment of appetizers, including three trays of sushi.  I was kind of surprised they were open for Christmas, but I suppose we are in a recession.

They set up a little gingerbread decorating activity for the kids.  The house on the left was "D's" (with a lot of help from Mrs. Fly).  The house on the right is G's.  I realize he's only 7, but it's becoming clear to me that he is never going to do anything that even remotely relates to neatness.  And in case you are wondering - No - G is not physically challenged (I think).  The house of the left reminds me of a Seurat, and the house on the right is more like a Picasso.  Unfortunately, I don't think anyone's going to be ponying up 8 figures for *that* house.  Anyway, it was good for a laugh.

My brother is a lot like me in that we like serving two kinds of dead animal at big gatherings.  Dead animal #1 was this crown of lamb, with Mrs. Fly's "famous" seasoned rice in the middle.  I was really craving lamb, but I pretty much ate a whole tray of sushi by myself, so I only had like 4 pieces of lamb.  As mentioned in a previous post, lamb is supremely underrated in the US.

They also made a beef rib roast, but that was severely overcooked (it was pretty much well done), but it still had good flavor.  I only had one serving (which was like a pound).  But needless to say, 1 tray of sushi + 4 pieces of lamb + 1 slab of rib roast = BloatedFly.  Not that I'm complaining.  :-)

My sister-in-law *loooves* ordering meat from Niman Ranch.  They are well-known for their (black pig) pork products.  I've seen several fine restaurants that listed "Niman Ranch pork," which definitely means they are not your ordinary meat supplier.  Regular US pork has been bred over the decades to be absurdly lean - pretty much to the point that it tastes like cardboard.  The Niman Ranch pork has better marbling, so it's juicier.  The last 5-10 years, their other meat products seem to be getting popular as well.  I think the quality is very good, but tbh, I don't think it's worth the 5x markup over a good local supermarket.  Anyway, in case you win a donkament or something and feel like you need to blow some money on dead animal, check it out.