Coq a Vin...

The chicken was purple. Like, in a blue way. The photo does not do it justice. It's probably pointless to post this picture, except I think it does illustrate how unappetizing the meat turned out.
It looked positively revolting when I removed it from my beloved enameled cast iron casserole. I returned the chicken to the pot and it was like a carnival dunk tank filled with butter and other viscous fats, and anything with that much butter (and other viscous fats) cannot stay truly purple. So when it hit the table, the "chicken cooked in wine" was brownish-purple, and luckily I'd already plied the guests with blue cheese (it was Maytag, and that's really how they spell it) turnovers and booze. Plus the scalloped potatoes were quite breathtaking in the cast iron skillet, topped as they were with patches of browned, bubbled Jarlesberg cheese. So everyone graciously (and tipsily, I think) overlooked the dyed poultry.
The asparagus was lovely (I didn't tie it like Julia said I should, but Husband was very conscientious with the salt-to-boiling-water ratio, so they were well-seasoned) if a little overcooked (I blame Julia for that, actually. She said it would take 12 minutes; I checked them after 9 and they were already a little soggy). Maybe it would have been better if I'd peeled them like she said I should. But Husband prevailed in that as well, scanning the destroyed teensy kitchen and pointedly remarking that he had never, ever eaten a peeled asparagus spear. Plus we had guests and at that moment Dog was their only available host; she tends to be overly demonstrative and olfactorily curious, especially when pastries are being eaten on her couch. So peeling like 30 asparagus spears was completely out of the question.
Oh my, I still shudder to think of the way our kitchen looked as we sat down to eat. There were so many soiled, damp kitchen towels! The little pot smeared with melted chocolate (oh, but the entire cake got eaten even after that audaciously rich coq a vin! I'm getting better with that chocolate cake); the slightly bigger pot that served as a double boiler; the huge pot we used to boil the asparagus--ew, green, asparagus-smelling water--; the various dinner plates, strainers, forks, salad plates, ramekins...Lions and tigers and bears, my ass. Oh my.

But it was worth it. We sat at our makeshift "dining room" table until after midnight (on a Wednesday!). We talked about politics, feminism, football, basketball and baseball, TV, real estate...In short, it was the quintessential dinner party. For some of you, that might sound frightfully quotidian, and someday I'll explain why it wasn't so for me. But Jeebus, I can't get into it now. Look: this is a very long and disappointingly-illustrated blog post. Husband is all up in my grill about brevity being the soul of wit (actually he tactfully suggested that I start a haiku blog), so I'm going now.