Jay and Mally came for dinner to celebrate Larry’s birthday (a couple of days early). Larry’s favorite foods tend towards the homey comfort foods, which works well for me since that tends to be what I like to cook. He especially loves apple pie, and this is the only one I make. It’s beautiful and really tasty and you don’t have to worry about having a tented top crust because the leaves move down with the filling.

Instead of the standard vanilla ice cream, we decided on sour cream – it’s lightly sweetened, and tastes like… frozen sour cream. That’s a good thing, it’s really rich and creamy and went well with the pie. The pumpkin ice cream was a bonus, because we had a sugar pumpkin in our CSA share this week. I roasted it, pureed the flesh, and then cooked it on the stovetop some more to concentrate the flavor. Everyone liked it but it’s probably not a make-again.

• Mustard, Sage & Maple-Glazed Pork Roast with Garlic-Roasted Potatoes (Fine Cooking #75, Holidays Winter 2006, p. 41)
• Sweet-Sour Red Cabbage (Fine Cooking #75, Holidays Winter 2006, p. 42)
• Sauteed Greens with Cannellini Beans and Garlic (Bon Appetit, April 2008)
  
• Apple Pie Covered with Leaves (Fine Cooking #54, Winter 2003 Holiday Baking Issue, p. 43)
• Sour Cream Ice Cream (Pure Dessert, p. 49)
  
• Pumpkin Ice Cream (David Lebovitz)

Wine: Sea Smoke 2005 Botella Pinot Noir (Santa Rita Hills, California). Perfection in a bottle.