A post about food from someone who doesn't cook but knows how to eat

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How was your weekend? I felt like we spent most of the weekend at the grocery store. We went to Whole Foods on Friday to select meat for Meatfest (P.S. this is not a real festival, just an excuse to prepare an obscene amount of meat with your family), and then headed to Hy-Vee on Saturday morning to get the ingredients for peanut butter and chocolate pie and Filipino eggrolls, which is what we'll be contributing to Thanksgiving this year. You're welcome.

A word about the origins of Meatfest: Amy and Nick texted us about doing dinner with them and we said, sure, what do you have in mind? And then the return text basically read something like "a plate of meat". And thus, Meatfest was born. After visiting with the meat counter guy at Whole Foods, Josh selected the hanger steak tenders.

As a side note, I think it's quite endearing the way the Thiessen men talk about their food. They are a passionate people. Dexter and I were standing off to the side and I could see Joshie nodding his head and using emphatic gestures while visiting with the meat guy about the tenderness and flavor of the hanger steak. His dad is the same way; uber-detailed discussions of shrimp have happened. I'm telling you, it's a very lucky thing that I married into this family. They care about their food. A carefully crafted delicious meal from Joshie is like the Sistine Chapel and let me tell you, the Sistine Chapel is tasty.

Well, that was one helluva side note, right?

Anyway, verdict is that the hanger steak is worth pursuing. Josh marinated half of it in a sauce that is similar to the ginger sauce from Ohana's and half without a marinade and both were excellent. Flavorful and tender as promised by the meat guy. Nick and Amy used a Pioneer Woman's recipe for short ribs and I believe the judges (that would be the four of us) decided that it tasted like a roast and the ribs were considerably fatty. Also, I think that we are in agreement that Amy makes up a mean batch of mashed potatoes.

And if that's not enough food talk for you, we went for Thai food at Lemongrass in West Des Moines for my dad's birthday. The verdict there is good food and OMG, toddlers are terrible dinner guests. That's a side note for another day though.