Hello, everyone!

You all made me smile with your kind words about my food journal post. It’s one of those things where it just hasn’t quite become a “habit” yet, but I am definitely working on it.

Thanks also for the GREAT wedding song suggestions, too! Once I get a playlist together, I will post it on the blog. It will be quite a diverse mix of music, let me tell you 🙂

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to attend the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pans, a meeting of a wonderful group of women who get together for delicious dinners and healthy conversations. The one and only Mara invited me for this special occasion – the theme was Central America. You can read her absolutely stunning detail of events – with gorgeous pictures – on her blog.

Here’s a photo taken by Amy, the hostess for the evening. Clockwise from left: Tina, Leigh (Mara’s sister!), Mimi (Mara’s mom!), Mara, Beth, Me, Sue and Liz.

When I arrived at Amy’s home, I was immediately offered a cooling glass of white wine sangria on a very humid Chicago evening. You can probably guess my response.

Absolutely! The white wine sangria was one of the most refreshing cool drinks I’ve had in a long time. It featured homemade limoncello, fresh citrus, and prosecco. Perfectly sweet and “ahh” inspiring.

I truly enjoyed meeting and chit chatting with all the ladies and watching as they put together an absolutely incredible feast. While we were standing around talking, we snacked on a light and tasty crab ceviche on top of fresh cucumbers and guacamole – a fabulous contribution from Beth.

I also watched as two delicious creations came out of the oven from Tina and Mara. The first was jokingly dubbed, “Yucca Surprise” by Tina, who attempted to make a yucca pastry dough and found it was very hard to get the yucca to turn into a flour consistency! But through the challenges came the most delicious looking pastries, stuffed with shrimp and oozing with flavor.

Mara contributed Venezuelan arepas, which, according to her post, are a “tender corn cake that’s split and then stuffed with a variety of ingredients.”

She also made slow-cooked three-pepper chicken and had queso fresco, avocado and sour cream on hand for the toppings. She had all the fixins’ and we were definitely ready to eat!

The table setting was out on Amy’s back porch and was absolutely gorgeous. Amy works at one of my favorite stores of all time and you could tell that it inspired the beautiful ambiance.

Before we knew it, the sistahood was sitting down to eat! You must excuse my slightly poor quality photos in the dim light. They don’t do this food justice!

I grabbed a bite of everything. In the bottom you can see Mara’s arepas, which I topped with the chicken, queso fresco, sour cream and tomato. Clockwise from there, we have Mara’s mom Mimi’s Puerto Vallarta-Style shrimp burgers, which had an absolutely amazing flavor and were served on mini buns with arugula and more sour cream. Next we have chorizo-stuffed tomatoes from Liz. These were phenomenal with a little bit of oven-browned cheese on top! Finally, I also tried a “Yucca Surprise” from Tina, as well as a radish and fruit salad from Sue.

I was overwhelmed by the care and quality of every dish. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pans certainly knows how to throw an amazing dinner party! We continued gabbing for hours and eventually the conversation led back into the kitchen to prepare dessert!

And OH what a dessert selection there was! Amy made a Tres Leches cake topped with whipped cream and fresh raspberries from her garden {how amazing!} and Leigh, Mara’s sister and a damn good pastry chef, brought a cinnamon bread pudding topped with dulce de leche cream and berries that she picked up from the farmer’s market and spiked with a pepper called espelette.

None of my pictures can truly do these two desserts justice, so I am borrowing Mara’s. I hope you don’t mind, Mara – it was just too mouthwatering to resist!

The rich creams paired with the moist bread pudding and tres leches cake really put me in food bliss. I could have gone back for more had my stomach not been ready to explode from every taste sensation, so I settled on bringing some home with me for later 😉

Thanks again to Mara for the invitation and to Amy for hosting! I had a marvelous time and can’t wait to see where we go next – and contribute a recipe of my own!

Have you ever had an “around the world” dinner party? If so, what theme?!

On the agenda this week:

• Insanity Month One workout review
• Couscous and smoothie review {but not necessarily together…} 😉
• More food journaling?
• More wedding planning! 109 days…AHH!
• Taste of Chicago
• Unexpected surprises {there are bound to be some!}

Hope YOUR weeks are off to a wonderful start!

Abrazos,