This year I tried the recipe from one of my favorite food blogs, Kalyn's Kitchen. I was really glad I chose this recipe because it was absolutely delicious!

(Makes 6-8 servings, recipe created by Kalyn with inspiration from The Gourmet Cookbook.)

1 onion, chopped in fairly small pieces
1 cup celery, chopped in fairly small pieces
1 T olive oil
1 tsp. minced garlic
2-3 cups diced ham (cut off the ham rind and save)
8 cups homemade chicken stock
(or use water with chicken soup base or canned chicken broth)
2 16 oz. packages frozen black-eyed peas
(or use 6 cups freshly cooked black-eyed peas or 4 cans black-eyed peas)
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1 bunch fresh collard greens, chopped (about 2 cups when measured after chopping, but next time I would use more)
pinch red pepper flakes (optional)
2 tsp. apple cider vinegar, or more to taste
Optional: ham flavor base if needed (I like Goya Ham Flavor Concentrate if you can find it)

In large frying pan, saute onion and celery in olive oil about 5 minutes, until starting to soften. Add garlic and saute 2 minutes more, then add ham and saute over very low heat 10 minutes. (Don't skip this step, which concentrates the ham flavor into the vegetables.)

Transfer mixture to large soup pot, add chicken stock, black eyed peas, dried thyme, and ham rinds if available, and cook at very low simmer for one hour.

After soup has cooked one hour, taste for flavoring. Add more water and ham flavor base if needed. (It will depend on your ham, but I usually add a tiny bit. I added about 2 cups more water to the soup at this point.) Add chopped collard greens, stir into soup and simmer one hour more, or until black-eyed peas are quite soft.

When black-eyed peas are as soft as you want them, remove pieces of ham rind, then use an immersion blender, food processor, or hand masher to partially process about half the soup. You want a mixture of broken and unbroken black-eyes peas, with some thickening of the soup from the pureeing process. Be careful not to over process. Add red pepper flakes and vinegar and simmer 10 minutes more (or longer, I sometimes cook as much as an hour more at this point.) Serve hot.

In recent years New Year's Eve has just been another night - no special celebrations. I hate driving anywhere that night, so staying home was the obvious answer.

But now we have a really nice local restaurant just a few miles away, and they were offering a special New Year's Eve dinner, so two of the couples on our street decided to join us at the Grand Oak Steakhouse at Highland Springs Resort.

We had an early reservation, so early that it wasn't even dark yet.

But, first things first - the wine. Only two of us are drinkers, so I brought a bottle of 2000 cabernet to drink.

Either a 3-course or a 5-course meal was offered, with two choices for each course. To taste the maximum number of courses, Bill chose one and I chose the other, except for the entree. Here are the food photos and descriptions from the menu:

Pre-dinner snack (maybe amuse bouche?)
Cauliflower creme (smooth as silk and delicious)

Course #1

Trio of Salmon (Salmon roe on blini, tartar and olive wood smoked Balik lax with beets and fine herbes)

Twist on Waldorf Salad (Escarole, endive, candied walnuts, apples, celery root and gorgonzola cheese)

Wild mushroom consomme with sherry and duck confit ravioli

Jerusalem artochoke soup with pistachios and hazelnut oil

Course #3

Purple sea bass & bay leaf shrimp, black noodles, fennel, basil and saffron-vanilla foam

Kabocha ravioli, spiced raisins, baby turnips and kumquat emulsion

Course #4

Grand Oak filet wellington, parsley, winter greens and red wine jus (the other entree choice was a vegetarian gratin with winter root veggies)

Course #5

Meyer lemon souffle with marbled chocolate and huckleberry ice cream

Caramelized champagne creme, pyramid cake, quince and anis

Palma and I shared a bowl of Wild Mushroom soup, as did Bill. I just loved the little pot that it was served in.

And the soup was definitely to die for!

I thought my entree was the most unusual thing on the menu. It was called the Cuistot Lunch Box - it was served on a square plate with four sections. A small soup and salad, the entree that day was salmon and spinach topped with pastry. Last but certainly not least was a small raspberry creme brulee. I love trying small portions of several different items, so this was perfect for me.

Bill had one of the daily specials, a seafood salad with big chunks of five different fishes.

And Brad had duck with fava beans.

We all enjoyed our lunches, but the best part was catching up on things with Palma and Brad. That was priceless!

I was excited to participate for the third year in the foodie gift exchange organized by Katie of Thyme for Cooking.

Last year my gift came from a blogger in Germany. This year I was thrilled to receive a package from Australia - from Kate of Manningroad.

Kate sent me an assortment of Australian spices:
Australian Bush Herbs
Aussie Meat Pie Spice
Australian Bush Pepper Blend
Murray River Pink Salt
Wattleseed Roasted
Mixed Spice

I need to read up on all of these spices to see how they should be used.

She also enclosed a darling little silver spice spoon and a recipe for Lemon Butter, which I intend to make very soon:

Ingredients:
180g butter, diced
2 cups caster sugar
3/4 cup lemon juice
2 tsp grated rind
4 eggs, beaten and strained

Method:
Combine all ingredients in top half of double saucepan. Stir over simmering water until mixtures thickly coats the back of a wooden spoon. Pour into hot sterilized jars. Seal when cold. Serve on toast, scones, or in pre-made tartlets with coffee shards.

Thank you so much, Kate!

Why is it that almost everyone makes resolutions for the new year? And, most of the time, breaks them not long after January 1st.

A major portion of them are about losing weight and eating healthier. Check - that's one of mine again this year. I want to lose at least 10 pounds before Bill and I go to Paris in May. That way I can try every flavor of Macarons I see!

But, just as important, I want to get back to blogging. Like a lot of people I got "writer's block" about six months ago. Heck, I didn't even finish blogging about Venice when I was there. I am going to remedy that and finish my trip blog posts.

See, if I promise to do that here in writing, I will have to follow thru. And following thru is important in life.

So, I was really, really happy that Shannon and Kim chose La Zucca for our Monday night dinner.

All of the rave reviews were confirmed - the food was wonderful!

We started with a couple orders of Pumpkin Flan. Wow and double wow! It was wonderful!

I then chose a Lasagna special, but I am not sure what kind it was. I will check with one of my compadres and post later about it.

We also shared an assortment of vegetables.

And we shared three different desserts.

We met our guide Andrea and the boat captain on a little canal-side calle (we had to switch the location because the trash boat refused to move), and off we went.

Our first destination was Murano where we cruised down Murano's main canal past lots of glass factories like this one.

Lots of great views.

Torcello was on my to-do list because of its historical significance, and we docked there to see their main church, S. Maria Assunta.

And here I am in the Hun chair.

On the way home we stopped in the middle of nowhere to have a picnic on the boat in the lagoon. Here is our captain preparing the food - local sausage and cheese and good bread and (of course) wine. Yummy! And what a great view.

Kim, your glass is empty!

Shannon needs some wine too!

Almost back to Venice now. This is how the captain steers the boat - standing up.

What a beautiful day out on the lagoon!

I had dragged along my raincoat because the weather forecast had predicted rain, so I actually got to wear it. And I was glad to have it because it just poured and poured.

We took the vaparetto down to San Marco and visited the Correr Museum for a couple of hours. Although a much smaller museum than Accademia, we really enjoyed the intimacy of it. Here are a couple of links with museum information.

Http://www.tickitaly.com/galleries/correr-venice.php

Http://www.venetia.it/m_correr_eng.htm

Http://www.venice-sights.co.uk/museo-correr.htm

Then off to lunch at a fantastic restaurant, Taverna San Trovaso where I had my very first taste of Fegato alla Veneziana (liver Venetian style), served traditionally with polenta. It was yummy.

But wait - the day is not over yet! We hit a couple of wine bars and then dinner at Shannon's favorite pizza place. I had Brie & Walnut pizza because it sounded unusual. Yum, it was great!

And here is Kim and me enjoying a little vino with our pizza.

It took two trips to get everyone's luggage transferred to the apartment that we would be staying in for a week on the GrapeHops Venice Tour. Whew! We deserved a little Prosecco!

Once our tour-mates Kevin, Jill and their daughter Megan arrived (and we rested up a little bit), Shannon and Kim had a special surprise for us.

The Arsenale in Venice is a huge shipbuilding dockyard from the glory days of La Serenissima. It is closed and inaccessible to the public except for a couple of special events during the year. This weekend happened to be one of those special events.

Here are a couple of websites where you can read about the Arsenale:

Http://www.venice-sights.co.uk/arsenale.htm

Http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venetian_Arsenal

We got to see some very old ships like this one that was built for a Doge - very posh and ornate.

The views out on the water were great. Check out the last photo and what do you see in the background? Right - a huge cruise ship going down the adjacent canal.

Back to our rooms for a little wine on the terrace.

Then off to dinner at Da Alberto, the same restaurant that Shannon, Kim and I had visited on my first night in Venice. Palma and I shared a yummy risotto with asparagus and shrimp plus a filet with rosemary and tomatoes.

Here's Palma and me.

And Shannon and Kim.

We ordered the most glorious large platters to share.

This is the seafood platter.

And here is the meat platter.

What a great dinner! We sat out on the campo after dinner and enjoyed the warm beautiful weather and the ambiance. After all, this is Italy!

The first walk began with the location of the first book, "Death at La Fenice". I didn't get to the famed opera house until 1 pm because I was looking for a power cord for my laptop - I have since found the power cord (so happy about that).

So, I did the tour of La Fenice with audioguide. It was quite a beautiful place, which is remarkable since it burned down three different times - in 1774, 1836, and 1996.

I only completed the first two of the Brunetti Walks today because I kept getting lost and backtracking, but here are some of the sights I did find from the book. I will add the specific book comments later.

La Fenice Opera House

Hotel Fenice behind the opera house

Fantin Fiori, the most expensive florist in the city, where Signorina Elettra ordered her weekly flowers

On the other hand, Biancat (Brunetti's favorite florist) was nowhere to be found. I had the street address from Donna Leon's website, and all I found at that address was this dress shop. No other florist in the area.

The famous view from the Rialto Bridge

Cantina Do Mori

Antico Dolo

Ugliest bank in Venice, according to Brunetti

Brunetti's street, Calle Tiepolo

The end of Brunetti's street where the police launch picks him up.

But first we met up with Kevin and Jill from Australia, who will be our companions on the GrapeHops tour beginning on Saturday. Their daughter Megan will be joining up with us tomorrow.

Here is a photo of the view from Ruth and Martin's living room window - pretty spectacular!

And here are Shannon and Ruth, authors of the wonderful "Chow Venice" book that so many Slow Travelers have used to choose great places to eat and drink in Venice.

After enjoying the view (and the company) for awhile, we headed over to Ruth's favorite pizza place for dinner.

I chose an unusual-sounding pizza with arugula (one of my favorite things), raw beef, and balsamico. Sounds strange but very good.

And the wine . . . You knew there would be wine - right? Shannon was thrilled to find this particular wine there - Ottin Pinot Noir. And she was right - it WAS delicious!

Shannon had things to do, so Kim and I headed down to Campo S Maria Nova to try to get our WiFi up and running. We had signed up for WiFi thru Venice Connected. So, instead of walking thru Venice, here we are:

Later we walked along the Fondamenta Nove and enjoyed a drink overlooking the water. Out in the distance you can see Isola di San Michele, the cemetery island.

Later we met Shannon at a new wine bar where we sampled some white wines from the Veneto area. Here's Shannon and Kim:

I arrived in Venice on Wednesday evening, and Shannon met me at the airport to help me with my luggage (thank you Shannon). We took the Alilaguna boat into the city and even had a little wine along the way. What a beautiful entry to the city that is!

The apartment that I am sharing with Shannon and Kim for my first three nights is not too far from the Fondamenta Nove - great location, but the downside is that it is up on the 4th floor (5th by US standards), and there were 77 steps to get up there! Yikes!

We walked to dinner at a great little place that Shannon knew, Da Alberto and had three of their evening specials, two pastas and steak with gorgonzola, which we shared. The gnocchi with salmon was especially good.

Like a lot of people, traveling to a destination is a chore - not fun at all. But it's something that must be endured in order to enjoy the vacation.

I did have the benefit of traveling business class this time - it cost me a ton of AmExp points, but it was definitely worth it.

I was on an early afternoon flight to Denver, then to Frankfurt. After a five-hour layover there, finally to Venice.

Ontario Airport was pretty deserted - good for me but bad for the airport economy. I hate going to LAX, so I hope Ontario can survive the decline in travel that it seems to be experiencing.

I had never flown thru Denver or Frankfurt before, but I was really impressed with Denver but not so much Frankfurt.

The international flight from Denver to Frankfurt was on Lufthansa, my very first time on one of their flights. The Business class cabin was lovely, and the bonus was that I had no one sitting next to me. In fact, the row in front of me just had one passenger on each side. I asked the flight attendant why someone hadn't been upgraded to those seats, and she said that they didn't do that. Huh? Very strange . . .

Frankfurt was huge and congested, and I had to go thru security several times during my five-hour layover. Not that I ever left the terminal because I didn't. My carryon contained all of my electronics, and they hand-searched it twice. I cannot find the power cord to my computer, so I can only assume it wasn't put back after the search. Now to find a new power cord in Venice . . . I may have to post blog episodes on a public computer without photos. Stay tuned!