For dinner tonight, I made Jay and Larry one of my favorite foods – fried chicken. It’s coated in buttermilk and flour first so it formed a nice, crispy coating. The cucumber salad was also really good – the dressing also had buttermilk so it paired well with the chicken.
The potatoes had so much potential, but I was disappointed. They were good (besides needing more salt), but I like Potatoes Fondantes better. I threw the cake together quickly while I was putting the rest of the dinner together – Larry cooked the chicken for me so I could finish it up. It’s really good. Very light. Larry says it’s a definite do-again.

• Buttermilk Country Fried Chicken with Cucumber Salad (Fine Cooking #83, January 2007, p. 82a)
• Crispy Smashed Roasted Potatoes (Fine Cooking #83, January 2007, p. 45)
• Velvety Cocoa Cake (Gale Gand’s Short and Sweet, p. 61)

Wine: Grey Wolf 2003 Zinfandel the Jackal (Paso Robles, California). We have three bottles of this wine, picked up when we worked the Paso Robles Zinfandel festival last year. It got better after it opened up – very fruity.