Heart Shaped Food Dinner

Quite randomly I came home Friday suddenly afflicted with some silly cold. Hubs asked what I wanted for dinner and when I said burger he lovingly went on a run to find me one. Then most of Saturday/Valentine's Day I was useless. Although we did get to watch a giant chunk of Elementary season 2 while I huddled under blankets. By Sunday I was feeling more uppity so we cooked our Valentine's Day dinner a day late, which really was just dinner with more red things and dough shaped into a heart because why not!

We started off with the fanciest cocktail we've ever constructed at home. And it was so delicious! It was fun to sip it and try to detect all the flavors and to have the rose water syrup linger on your tongue. Adding the sparkling water was perfect to give it a little fizz but also make it a larger drink without adding more alcohol. Here it is, make it!

Rose Grapefruit Cocktail:

First you have to make rose simple syrup and this can be kept in the fridge for a week. You can also use the extra rose water syrup to add a 1 to 3 of sparkling water.
1 1/4 cup water
2 cups sugar
1/4 cup rose water
3 tbs lime juice

1   bring water and sugar to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes, stir occasionally
2   add in rose water and lime juice and simmer for 10 more minutes, stir occasionally
3   remove from heat and let cool before using in drink, store in fridge

for the drink:
1.5 oz gin
.75 oz rose syrup
.75 oz grapefruit juice
.25 oz lemon juice
2 dashes of peach bitters
cardamom pod
ice
sparkling water

1   in a shaker lightly muddle the cardamom pod
2   add in gin, rose syrup, grapefruit juice, lemon juice, peach bitters and a few cubes of ice
3   shake and strain over ice
4   add in sparkling water and finish with a twisted lemon peel

I wanted to make pizza (because we love it almost as much as we love one another) but I wanted a little spin on it so I made my charred pepper sauce as the base. This sauce is so versatile and really quite easy to make. Now a huge hit on pizza in our opinions! Then we layered on 3 types of mushrooms (decadence!), crumbled spicy sausage, sprinkled on some goat cheese and grated pecorino. Wowza this pizza should be sold somewhere! Best combo ever I now believe!

We also had a mixed greens strawberry salad with cranberry mustard dressing which was very adorable and very tasty. I've listed it out below.

Mixed Greens Strawberry Salad with Cranberry Mustard Dressing:

5-6 cups mixed greens
8-10 strawberries, cut off greens and slice
4 radishes; sliced

Homemade Granola Croutons:
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup sliced almonds
1/2 cup pistachios
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tbs fennel seeds
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg white
1/4 cup olive oil

1   preheat oven to 350 degrees F and mix all ingredients in a bowl
2   spread out mixture on baking sheet and bake for 10-15 minutes
3   let clusters cool before putting on salad


Cranberry Mustard Dressing:

3 tbs olive oil
2 tbs lemon juice
1 tbs cranberry mustard
1 1/2 tsp honey
a little salt and pepper

1   mix all ingredients together well in small bowl and drizzle over salad