Bon Appetit

If you were at that Holiday party last night and are now feeling a little...tired...eat bruschetta and watch Julie and Julia with your long-legged 12 year-old daughter. Then blog about it. This exercise will string back together any loose brain cells and send feelings of comfort and joy to your core.

In the movie, Julie Powell (Amy Adams) whips up a batch of bruschetta for her adorable husband Eric (Chris Messina) and he wolfs it down while inspiring her to blog about cooking. It was during the scene with the chopped fresh yellow and red tomato medley piled on thick slices of pan-fried-in-butter French bread that we hit "pause" and headed to the kitchen. Isabel chopped, and I sautéed. She tossed plum tomatoes with olive oil, course salt, pepper and basil. I started the bread-seared-in-butter a second time without garlic so it wouldn't burn. Isabel squeezed fresh lemon juice in her mix. I sliced pieces of Manchego, fresh mozzarella and smoked apple cheddar cheese to have on the side. This wasn't in the movie, by the way. The dog's ottoman covered with a checkered table cloth set with white china plates made a wonderful table. She had orange juice. I had seltzer.

The tossed tomato concoction over the slices of bread browned with butter was gorgeous. Delightful. Heavenly. Medicinal, even.

Also in the movie Julia Child (Meryl Streep) discovers French cooking while in Paris with her adorable husband Paul (Stanley Tucci). It's difficult to describe Meryl Streep as Julia Child in Paris. The adjectives in my repertoire don't do justice. You can't help but fall in love, again, with this version of Streep and her relationships with people and food.

We left just a smidgen of the tomatoes but no bread or cheese for my adorable husband. Oh well.

You already know, of course, that the dream of being a successful writer comes true for both Julie and Julia in the books, the movie and real life.

 After we finished our spontaneous and delicious brunch, Isabel looked at me and said with satisfaction and confidence, "Mom, you should blog about this."

Where do I begin?