In the oven

Here's tonight's beef bourguignon, with the pinot noir from Barefoot Wine & Bubbly in Santa Rosa, California. I recently found Barefoot wines in the grocery store and I have fallen in love with their totally delicious Moscato - I am a huge fan of sweet dessert wines, especially when they have a delicious peachy flavor.

But anyway, I couldn't do a dramatic pour right straight from the bottle into the casserole like Amy Archer-as-Julie Powell did in Julie & Julia; I'm a piker and I have to use the trusty old Pyrex measuring cup I got as a wedding shower gift nineteen years ago.

The beef is simmering in the wine and stock combination in the oven right now, and the aroma is so heavenly, I'm nearly transported with happiness. And also my stomach is growling. In another half an hour, I have to go and sauté the mushrooms with a whole lot of butter and a little bit of chopped scallion. At 8:15, the girls will set the table and by 8:30, my husband will walk in the door, sniffing appreciatively, and say "What smells so good?"

Whoever would have thought that the guy who preferred canned biscuits -- CANNED BISCUITS, I ask you! -- to homemade and who felt, when all was said and done, that a sad little New York strip cooked extra well done until it was curled up on the plate was a really good steak would have come to appreciate Julia Child's recipes so much?

I wish I could invite you all here for dinner, my friends. Only I don't have enough cloth napkins and we'd all have to use the paper kind.

Bon appétit!