My first meetup

I went to my first meetup event with SD Vegetarians Unite this afternoon. We met at Madras Cafe, a south indian all veg restaurant on Black Mountain Road. There were about 20 people of all ages there, it was so awesome. I met some very nice vegetarians and vegans and it was a lovely relaxed time. Hmmm, how much of that was due to the little bean being home with her dad???? I refrained from talking about her the WHOLE time, but she did come up in conversation ;) It was a buffet lunch, with 20 different dishes, most of which I couldn't name. The curries are different than the standard indian fare (no tandoori, matar paneer, etc). The spicy eggplant was my favorite, but I also loved the dosa with lentil filling. Yum. It was very cool to eat somewhere with 100% vegetarian offerings. After lunch I went to Ker & Little, the huge indian market next door, with a neat woman from the meetup. I picked up tamarind paste and rosewater, which I haven't found anywhere else, and also, some Paneer!

Which led to...the hubby making homemade Palak Paneer for dinner! He used the recipe from the Fullerton SRF indian cookbook (ca. 1980), and I whipped up a small batch of garam masala to use. It was great, and the little bean cleaned her plate. I think using fresh spinach helped the deliciousness. It was also fun to put as much paneer as we wanted in it, usually those are the small jewels you have to hunt for in your big old pile o spinach.