With all of the long weekends over the holidays, I found myself spending a lot of time relaxing in front of the TV, reading a book, even painting my nails. But when this past weekend rolled around, I wanted to make the most of my two days off – so I filled it with lots of plans.

On Friday, my friends Marnina and Seth joined Kirios and I for Shabbat dinner. Marnina and Seth have a wonderful cooking blog, http://ibeafoodie.wordpress.com, dedicated to making IBD friendly food for people with Crohn’s and Colitis, and all of their recipes are kosher too! Although most of the times I don’t need to restrict my diet, thanks to my wonder-medicine Remicade, Marnina and many other IBD patients do. It can be a struggle to find tasty and healthy recipes when foods that most people consider to be healthy options, like vegetables and whole grains, can cause the most harm.

Anyway, since we’ve been reading about each others’ love for cooking, it seemed like a no-brainer to join forces for an excellent meal. When Marnina showed up with a chocolate chip challah, I nearly died. Kirios has been asking me to make one since just about our first date, and I had yet to oblige. (As you can tell from my blog name, I’m a big challah fan…)  Challah was followed with a Thai sweet potato soup that I made with red curry paste and coconut milk. It was a new recipe for me, and it was so easy and delicious that my parents already made the recipe back inPittsburghfor dinner the other night! For our main course, we had chicken in white wine (chenin blanc) sauce with yellow peppers and mushrooms, a carrot and sweet potato dish prepared with maple syrup, and egg noodles. It was a chore saving room for dessert, but well worth it, since Marnina made carrot-cake with a dairy-free honey cinnamon cream cheese glaze. Mmm.

Saturday morning I put up some dough in my bread machine after breakfast, and stored it in the fridge for when I returned from the theater. I met up with a couple of folks to support our friend Ben in “Parfumerie” at 1^st Stage in Tyson’s Corner. As the Washington Examinor stated, “One of the liveliest characters is Arpad, a delivery boy, portrayed with exuberance by Ben Lurye.” (http://washingtonexaminer.com/entertainment/theater/2011/12/love-among-perfume-and-powder/2019841) I know the showed finished its run this weekend, but I can’t help plugging my friend! The show was very cute and entertaining.

After the play, I rushed home to prepare cinnamon bread with the dough I made in the morning, cream cheese, cinnamon, and sugar. Kirios came over just in time to help me… put it in the oven. 😛 (Just kidding, he’s very helpful around the apartment!) The bread barely had time to cool before we headed into DC to attend a birthday dinner for his high school buddy at Dukem, http://dukemrestaurant.com, a popular Ethiopian restaurant on U Street. Kirios ordered Gored Gored, a dish of raw diced beef, while I enjoy a vegetarian sampler with yellow peas, collard greens, cabbage, and a tomato salad. We also split an Ethiopian beer.

Following dinner, we headed over to Silver Spring for a belated holiday party hosted by a good friend, where my cinnamon bread was enjoyed by many of my old college friends. I was too full from dinner to have any myself, but luckily I stashed some in my freezer before embarking on our evening plans!

Sunday afternoon was of course the Steelers/Broncos playoff game. I of course took advantage of the opportunity to invite some friends over for food, drinks, and football. Kirios and I were joined by three friends for the game. Since we were winding down from a busy weekend, I kept the menu simple. Our guests brought veggies and hummus, and we took the opportunity to serve some leftovers from Kirios’ birthday party (back in October, and there’s still so much!), tortilla chips and guacamole, mozzarella sticks with marinara sauce, and oreos and brownies. Plus I prepared a simple baked ziti for our entrée. Everything was easy to serve and stress-free. Unfortunately, our victorious viewing party didn’t translate to an on-field victory for my men in black and gold. (Although Kirios looked very handsome in his new Troy Polamalu jersey.) With a season-ending loss, the weekend closed out on a lower note, but it was ok, because I was full with good food and friends.