The Dinner to End All Dinners

Before he moved to London, a good friend and I would make dinner for each other every Thursday night. Each week, we'd brainstorm ways to "out do" each other. From sweet potato fries and pecan crusted chicken to chocolate trifles and garlic mushrooms on toast, we'd take turns proclaiming our own dinners "the best ever" weekly for more than a year.

During his recent visit, we decided to team our efforts and make one incredible dinner of mashed potatoes, Brussels sprouts and steak. Each brought its own uniqueness...the mashed potatoes were a blend of sweet and Russet combined with peanut butter (yes, peanut butter), the Brussels sprouts were roasted and topped with crumbled bacon, and the steak was broiled with a dry meat rub and caramelized onions and mushrooms.

Below are the boiled potatoes prepped for mashing. Each kind was mashed separately with peanut butter added before blending together for a swirl-like effect.
Finished product.

Brussels sprouts with chopped onion, olive oil, salt and pepper ready for the oven. We used - and strayed slightly from - this recipe.

Another finished product with the crumbled bacon.

Prepping the meat for the broiler, using this rub recipe. We followed these instructions for caramelizing the onions. Admittedly, we didn't start caramelizing until the meat was nearly ready for the broiler, so the onions were really more "coated" than "caramelized."

The complete meal.

Call me boastful, but I really think we outdid ourselves here. Every part of this meal was perfect. The peanut butter brought a really nice flavor to the potatoes, and I never quite realized what I was missing before putting all of those spices on the steak (far better and easier than store-bought marinades). And, while I once considered myself lucky to have avoided the torture of Brussels sprouts as a child, I have quickly joined the growing list of converted.

After dinner, we watched Julie & Julia, a quite appropriate way to end the evening. Good movie...I like to think we could have given both ladies a run for their money ;)