A Foggy Night in R-Town

On second thought, I guess I didn't seem so bad.

A phone call to Holmes to see what he and the little woman were up to told me they were making dinner at home together tonight.

No problem, I said, we'll get together next week.

A minute later the phone rang.

"Come over and have dinner with us," Holmes suggested.

Wouldn't I be interrupting an intimate evening for the two of them?

Apparently not.

I arrived during the prep stage, with much chopping and measuring going on.

Holmes had gone to Book People and picked up a copy of "Betty Crocker's Cooking with Wine," a slender 1974 volume that no doubt capitalized on the then-growing American interest in wine.

Even better, the moment I walked in, the TV was changed from football to PBS for, wait for it, "The Lawrence Welk Show."

And although I'd heard the jokes, I'd never actually seen the show.

Or the bubbles.

But for the two of them, both of their parents had made a ritual of watching the Welk show every Saturday night, so I was participating in a long-standing tradition.

I don't know what was funnier, the cheesy sets (you could see the pieces propping up the set fronts), the bad teeth (clearly cosmetic dentistry had not yet become mainstream, even for TV) and hideous costumes (blue chiffon meets hippie maxi dresses).

It was hysterical and, mercifully, brief.

Beaujolais nouveau, a Holmes favorite, was immediately poured for me and we munched on pot stickers with Holmes' secret sauce while I took charge as chief meal coordinator.

Or, as Holmes put it, I played referee so he and his beloved didn't kill each other during the process.

We actually made a hell of a team.

As the oldest of six (which didn't compare to one of the Welk singers who was described as "a father of ten"), bossiness runs in my veins, so I did my share of telling my hosts when to measure, when to thicken and when to stir constantly.

For the beef stroganoff we were making, we used a bottle of the homemade wine provided by Holmes' brother (who's also been known to make banana wine and tomato wine), which turned out to be much better than you'd expect.

The music was outstanding, first blaring the soundtrack to 1967's "Casino Royale" followed by "Live at the BBC (The Beatles Album)," classics both.

You can never go wrong with Burt Bacharach, Dusty Springfield or the lads from Liverpool before they hit big.

My hosts gave me all kinds of props during dinner, praising my assistance with the food and from keeping things from ending badly, both the meal and their relationship.

"This is the best stroganoff we've ever made. Next time we make this, you have to come back and help," my hostess insisted.

Will work for wine.

Holmes made a lame joke about going to Sweet Frogs afterwards, but one look from his beloved and he changed it to Amour.

So once we'd done a cursory job of cleaning up the kitchen, we headed out to walk there.

The fog had rolled in since I'd arrived, making alleys look picaresque, cars appear out of nowhere and photo ops abound at every corner.

We found a small crowd at Amour, but the two bar sitters moved so we could sit together.

Django Reinhardt was playing and the view of Cary Court shrouded in fog was framed in the big front window.

Since we'd come for dessert, we began with Lucien Albrecht Cremant d'Alsace Rose and a look at the evening's dessert specials.

Raspberry hazelnut panna cotta, chocolate caramel sea salt creme brulee and a trio of sorbets (kiwi, clementine and pear) comprising our game of musical desserts as we passed each around to the others.

I'd never had the pear sorbet before and maybe it's because I've been reveling in the little Seckle pears lately, but the flavor was a thing of beauty, delicate and deep at the same time.

A nearby map of France took us on a tangent to the connection between Nimes and RVA (duh, TJ and the Maison Carree) and Holmes' childhood trip to Europe.

"I wanted to get to Paris to play pinball," he stated about his family's whirlwind tour, surely the first time those words have ever been uttered.

We thought we'd be the last customers of the evening when two women arrived, taking a bar table behind us.

Soon they were enjoying Kir Royales and owner Paul brought out a bowl of sorbet with a lit candle in it.

One of the women began singing "Joyeux Anniversaire" to her friend before abandoning French and finishing with, "Happy birthday to you."

It was an unexpectedly charming moment.

By the time we finished our dessert smorgasbord, we were all but in a food coma and it seemed best to begin the walk back to the Holmes homestead.

If anything, the fog was denser and I led the way back under my flowered umbrella as the happy couple followed arm in arm.

People don't mind a fifth wheel as long as she knows her place.