Last night L, D, and I had a cooking lesson from Thad, the owner of Bacaro. We got to wear the cute little aprons and everything. He showed us how to make homemade ravioli (my pasta machine technique needs a lot of work), lemoncello and mint shrimp on buschetta, and a delicious and super-easy apple tart. (Apparently when you're trained at this CIA you don't have to live by the "if I told you I'd have to kill you" rule. Cause that's a rule in the real CIA, right? Note: I know this is not an actual rule.) I'm fairly confident that I could duplicate everything but the pasta at home, and I think I'm going to give the shrimp appetizer a try at the special brunch edition of Dinner Club next week. We also had gelato with the tart, and Thad is planning to sell gelato at Persimmon this summer, which will be an excellent addition to downtown. The only thing that could have made me happier was if Thad had gone through with his idea to open a pommes frites place here in town. Ever since Pekara opened and started serving crepes I've said the only other food I really missed from New York was a nice hot paper cone full of Belgian fries and mayonnaise to dip them in. I totally don't understand why pommes frites stands haven't taken over America. I mean, they're essentially French fries, so it's not like people would be scared to try them, but they're so so much better than any other way of cooking fries ever. Ah well, maybe someday my dream of a pommes frites stand on every corner will come true. Though it's probably better for my exercise regimen that it doesn't.