Saturday night I made the asiago and bacon potato gratin from this month's Cooking Light. Unlike previous gratins, this one asked me to pre-boil the sliced potatoes. And make a bechamel. And add cheese and bacon and chives to that bechamel (I'm not sure what's so light about it, either). And y'all? About a billion times better. Who knew my ultimate gratin would come from Cooking Light?

I served it with their suggestion, marinated grilled flank steak, on the grill pan. For the love of your dishwasher, make sure you heat your grill pan enough before putting the steak on it. If it's not hot enough, the steak will stick. And it's very unpleasant. Still delicious, but a mess.

Yesterday I was going to make shrimp with vanilla, from a NYT article of a week or so ago. I neglected to finish reading the recipe, so I had no white wine, no defrosted chicken stock, and no two hours marination time. Instead, I marinated the shrimp for 30 minutes in some lime juice, orange juice, olive oil, garlic, sugar and salt, and mashed up an avocado with some salt and lime and red onion and tomato. Then I seared the shrimp and served them with the guacamole, some shredded cheese, and some tortillas Jeff gamely picked up. I ate some of the shrimp plain, they were so good.