Last night I made chicken cutlets with a cider-mustard sauce in my new copper pot and y'all, the beauty of the reduction power in that pot is astounding. I will never make a reduction sauce in anything else ever again. And I learned that if you use sparkling cider instead of regular cider in a cider sauce, you get a sauce that is lighter and, well, more sparkly tasting.

However, the salespeople told my parents that you shouldn't heat the pot beyond low heat and I don't think that's true, is it? I mean, I cannot cook a steak over low heat and then make a reduction sauce. But surely steak is not beyond the power of the copper pot, is it?

(Dear Molly, you know I'm looking at you to answer this, right?)

I also made roasted cauliflower, defying all those stupid party menu books that warn against serving all white meals, because the Trader Joe's was OUT of spinach. How are you out of spinach, if you are a grocer? Anyway, in a panic I grabbed a bag of cauliflower florets even though I don't remember ever having cauliflower and I know I've never cooked it and I knew I probably wouldn't even like it, because one cannot think of things like all white plates when faced with a dilemma like the store not having any spinach.

I tossed the cauliflower with some olive oil and minced garlic and salt and pepper and then roasted it since that's what the Gourmet cookbook told me to do (and if you go visit that Amazon page, check out what other books customers who bought that book bought- clearly, they are my people). And, y'all? Cauliflower is GOOD. It's delicious! It's yummy. Who knew?

Next thing I'll learn that sprouts taste like chocolate. They don't, do they?