A Winelover's Wanderings

I know we always talk about Slow Travel GTG's, but I am here today to tell you about another kind of get-together - with my neighbors.

Bill and I live in the country on a dead-end street, and we are friendly with nearly all of our neighbors. For many years, we have been having GTG's two or three times a year with all of the neighbors who can come. Sometimes we order pizza, but sometimes it is a potluck. We drink lots of wine and catch up on all of the news.

Last Saturday was our latest GTG. Since it was winter, we decided that a soup event was in order. Plus appetizers plus dessert. You can be assured that no one ever goes hungry!

Our neighbors G & E were the hosts because they probably have the best place for entertaining a group, so we all converged there at about 3 p.m. We brought an appetizer (Luisa's Slow Bowl Chili Dip) and a soup (Jerry's Mexican Turkey Soup).

Our host had a new All Clad Slow Cooker with removable cooking insert, and he made Thomas Keller's (of French Laundry fame) Slow-Cooker Cassoulet. And was it ever yummy!

Here are some of the other appetizers:

A really great cheeseball and crackers:

A healthy veggie platter:

Little hot dogs in BBQ sauce:

Other soups included two kinds of chili (different and both delicious) and a slow cooked beef stew. The photos for those didn't turn out, so you will have to trust me that they were good!

By the time we had dessert, I was stuffed. But I didn't let that stop me - I sampled each and every dessert! No photos, though - sorry about that.

Last but not least was the wine. There were several white wines that we sampled. Bill and I brought a double magnum of 2002 Solaris Cabernet that we had been saving for a couple of years to have when there was a group to help drink it. And, yes, we did finish it all! Here is a photo of the bottle: