McBookwords - Blog: Valentine's Day

A Look Back on Valentine's Celebrations

Kolaches at special events.
Although I can not claim Czech heritage, my grandmother did met my grandfather on 16th Avenue in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Those familiar with the area will recognize the 16th Avenue reference as being in the heart of the Czech district in Cedar Rapids. So here is my holiday/entertaining homage to my grandparents.

Locate more information about the history of Kolaches at http://toriavey.com/toris-kitchen/2013/08/kolache/
"In America, kolache became common not only for all special events but also as a beloved comfort food and vehicle for ethnic identification. Czechs in America enjoyed their coffee with kolache, becoming a way of entertaining neighbors..." I love serving kolaches when I have friends over for coffee. If you are interested in making your own the toriavery.com site has a great recipe that is very close to the recipe used by my family.

These truffles were made using my friend Jean's truffle recipe. I'll share it here.

Heart shaped cookie cutters are perfect for cutting shapes out of melons or heart shaped pats of butter for toast or buns. We served melon and lots of fruit (pineapple, blackberries, blueberries, raspberries, and strawberries and bananas), along with granola for yogurt.

Put the butter in a dish or on the toast to melt as it wishes.

Flowers • Flowers • Flowers
I love flowers and on Valentine's Day, flowers, candy, and fruit are essential to the mood of the day.

Dinner

And for dinner -- chicken cordon bleu; or stuffed with broccoli and cheese, asparagus wrapped in bacon, and scalloped potatoes -- finished off with desert -- here is one offering: a chocolate covered strawberry with three miniature cheesecakes arranged on a dessert plate; and a depression era ruby red dessert bowl with New York Vanilla ice cream sprinkled with crushed red and white peppermint.

The dinner ware we used on this occasion is Franciscan stoneware in the Desert Rose pattern.

We have the Grandmug - perfect for coffee klatches, but fine for dinner as well. The desert rose pattern is perfect with red napkins and these large rose napkin rings -- pink and red vases of flowers follow the theme.