The Ten Best Meals of Our Marriage

As difficult as this is to narrow down to a mere ten, I was intrigued enough by Stasha’s Monday Listicles topic to enlist the help of the Fab Hub to help me try. This family loves good food and we have had many good meals. But if we had to pick ten of the best meals of our marriage, these are probably the winners.

Some of these were one-time deals; others are things we enjoy eating over and over again. There are some personal favorites and some shared. But each of these has a special place in our hearts (uh, stomachs). You’ll find that they are about so much more than the food (although that’s usually pretty good, too).

And so, in no particular order, here we go…The Ten Best Meals of Our Marriage.

1. First dinner as a married couple after our wedding dinner. When asked about our favorite meals, the Fab Hub and I always default to this one. Always. Our first dinner as husband and wife was a long, leisurely meal in the restaurant of a bed and breakfast in a private room (yup – they gave us our own little room). What did we have that was so good? Yes. From beginning to end, every part of the meal was unique and perfectly prepared. I think we each had the best steak of our lives that night. We tried wood squab in an appetizer. We enjoyed more than one glass of cognac. One of the best parts of the meal was the dining. No rush, nobody waiting for our table, no place to be afterwards. We sat and talked and ate and relaxed…awesome.

2. The “I could marry this guy” meal. OK, we need to go back in time a little for this one and, technically, it’s not a meal that is “of our marriage” but I think it counts. When the Fab Hub and I were “not dating,” we often grabbed dinner together out of practicality. (I know about three people who right now are saying “riiiight…”) Anyway, we often ended up at one particular place that had great food, great service, and didn’t really care if you hung around to talk past the end of your meal. One evening, as we were talking, I looked across the table and thought “holy crap – I could marry this guy.” It was the moment when I realized that this was it. I can probably guess what we had – we were pretty predictable – but it wasn’t so much the food that night as the moment.

3. Our rehearsal dinner. Want to guess where we had it? See #2. The menu included our favorites from what was, at that point, kind of “our place.” (It’s closed now…wonder if that’s a bad thing…) Fab Hub says he votes for this one not only because of the sentimental value and the great food, but because it’s a place at least one or two relatives probably would not have chosen otherwise. That sort of thing entertains him.

4. Honeymoon Eggs Benedict. Sticking with the wedding and honeymoon theme for one more, we have to mention the Eggs Benedict breakfast we had on the second leg of our honeymoon. At a different (but just as delicious) bed and breakfast, we enjoyed what were probably the best Eggs Benedict on the planet. They were so good we couldn’t stop thinking about them. We decided to learn how to make them ourselves so we could relive that taste sensation at home anytime. They’ve become legendary. Read on…

5. Mommy eggs and Daddy eggs breakfasts. We have passed our love of homemade Eggs Benedict on to Kidzilla – she calls those Mommy eggs. On “at home” days like weekends or holidays or snow days, Zilla often asks for Mommy eggs. Kidzilla loves her Hollandaise sauce. Just as often, though, she asks for Daddy eggs, which are those perfect scrambled eggs we talked about not too long ago. We admit to being fussy and spoiled, though – we really like them best at home, made our way. Call us egg snobs. We’re OK with that. Unlike regular “hurryupandeatyourbreakfastwegottago” days, Mommy eggs or Daddy eggs breakfasts are slower, easier occasions to just enjoy being together.

6. Thanksgiving morning breakfast. I am almost certain that right about now, Super Sister is saying “yeah Thanksgiving morning breakfast!” Thanksgiving is that one special holiday where everyone seems to get pulled in multiple directions and have more places to go and people to see than is reasonable for one day. It’s exhausting. And…the Fab Hub hates Thanksgiving. (That is a story for another day.) We have somehow ended up with a Thanksgiving tradition of our own which includes a small breakfast gathering for the three of us, my Mom, and Super Sister and her Super Fiancé before we all hit the ground running for the rest of the day. It probably started on a Thanksgiving where we weren’t going to actually see one another at the same dinner table…or something. The menu?  Mommy eggs, Daddy eggs, Fab Hub’s famous waffles and coffee, bacon (pig or turkey, your choice), fruit, juice, toast, sometimes muffins – the works. Who eats a huge breakfast on the biggest dinner-eating day of the year? Um…we do. Fab Hub liked it so much the first time we did it, that he asked to do it again and it stuck. I love it because it gives him a reason to enjoy Thanksgiving. Super Sister will vote for the food. Either way, it’s a win.

7. Zilla-Daddy mac and cheese dates. Fab Hub tossed this one in here. When I am out somewhere over a mealtime and the two of them are home alone, they often have Zilla-Daddy dates. Fairly often, the menu on these dates is Kraft mac and cheese. I know, I know. But it’s their thing. Fab Hub said this shouldn’t make the list because it excludes me, but I disagree. Sometimes, the reason for their date is because I happen to have a date with a friend or Super Sister. But most of all, I love that they have dates and that they have a thing that is just theirs – Zilla and her Daddy. As Zilla gets older, I’m sure they’ll expand their horizons. But I suspect mac and cheese will still be their number one favorite.

8. Steak and corn night. Fab Hub says that anytime he grills a steak, it’s a memorable meal. While that may be true, Zilla especially loves when her Fab Dad grills steak and corn on the cob. Whatever else we eat is pretty irrelevant – potato, salad, random veggies. It’s the steak and corn combo that she loves. This has become our go-to Fourth of July meal. We cook late, eat by candlelight, and watch the fireworks off our back deck. There is nothing quite like your own family ritual.

9. Pizza night. OK, I know, everybody does pizza night. But around here, pizza night often means friends or family are here and we’re just hanging out, doing nothing in particular. Or it was furniture moving day or some other project, which means pretty much the same thing. One of our new favorite places makes pizza just the way my Mom and I love it; they make it just like a local joint where my Grandparents used to take all of us for pizza when we were growing up. Pizza plus nostalgia equals great stories around the table. That is always a good time.

10. Picky plate lunch. What’s a picky plate, you ask? Well, I think my Mom came up with the term. Or maybe it was Mom’s Great Aunt B. who did. Regardless, the picky plate is what you have when you’re feeling “pickish.” You need to eat, but you don’t know what to eat. You don’t want to eat, but you know you should. Everybody wants something different, and nobody feels like making a decision. There isn’t a whole lot of any one particular thing in the fridge, so what do you have? A picky plate! The picky plate consists of whatever you want or whatever you have on hand…lunch meat, leftover chicken or meatballs, cold veggies or leftover warm ones, pickles, crackers, cubes of cheese, a hard boiled egg, the two bites of leftover spaghetti that won’t satisfy a bird…anything goes. If you want to put a modern term on it, call it a Bento-style lunch. We grew up calling it a picky plate. For me, it’s one more on the list of childhood memories. Great Aunt B. packed picky lunches for us to take along when we went to help my Mom decorate her classroom in August. Now it’s Zilla’s favorite lunch and, frankly, since the Bento box lunches are so popular, it’s easy to find ways to pack it for her to take to school.

So there you have it, friends…our ten best meals. What are your favorite meals or meal experiences? Share!

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