Spring Eats

Gentle readers, I've been a little absent for the past week, lacking enough mental energy to say anything half-way interesting.  But here's some happy news: I passed that urban planning exam! For a variety of reasons career-wise, I am so thrilled/relieved and ready to put all that studying behind me. 
The MM is in Arizona this week checking in with the southern arm of The Wildland Trekking Company and then driving a Suburban back up here for the Yellowstone season. So I won't be able to call up at noon and say, "Sweetie, do you think you could do supper tonight?" and come home to find this:

Seared tuna with a balsamic black olive tapenade vinaigrette on a bed of arugula. And pan-grilled French bread.  For reals. It was apparently far easier to prepare than it sounds and really good.  He continues to amaze me.
I found fresh fava beans at the store over the weekend.  For lack of any evidence of an old blog post about a pasta dish with favas, lemon and mint from last year, I just made one up last night. No photos yet, but I tossed the blanched favas together with mint, lemon zest, a little finely chopped red onion, olive oil, a little lemon juice, salt and pepper and then served it over tagliatelle. It was fresh and delicious, especially with some grated parmasean on top.  Dessert was vanilla ice cream with raspberries that I let sit in some balsamic, sugar and cracked black pepper for a few minutes. Yum!

We put in a lot of work on the outside of the house this past weekend, but I haven't loaded the photos yet. Here are those pillows from Furbish.  I love them!  See that bare wall to the left? That's where the built-in bookcases are going.  I'm failing miserably at being patient with their construction and installation.