You heard me.

Chocolate. Salami.

I had a sleepover with my very best friend in all of the land, Kerry, this past Friday. An earlier post on this blog had a picture of us in college, standing by the coffee pot, both quite the worse for wear. She’s the one that looks perkier than she perhaps ought to be, and I am the giant who looks like I might kill someone. We have known each other forever, through moves and tragedy and joy and everything else that happens over 30+ years.

This Friday I took the dogs, myself, and some chocolate salami over to her house to sit around, drink too many bourbon cocktails expertly prepared by her husband Mark, and to work on a puzzle.

You heard me. A PUZZLE.

Livin’ la vida loca.

But it’s not the puzzle. It’s the company.

When you are young and unencumbered by children, real jobs, and mortgages, you think nothing of sitting around in your pie pants all day, doing nothing. You have nothing really to do and all day to do it, and much of this lounging about is done in the company of good friends. As an adult, although I see Kerry often, I miss those days.

Plus, I need to tell her about a boy.

So it seems that chocolate salami is the thing to do, especially since my girl Kerry lurves her some white chocolate.

I used this recipe, with some modifications.

• Gluten-free animal crackers took the place of shortbread, and crispy rice was also gluten-free
• I used unsweetened dried cherries from Chukar Cherries in Washington. I could take a bath in these things.
• I have a kitchen scale so I utilized the weight measurements, but if you don’t they translate into about a cup each of the fruits and nuts
• Mise en place makes the recipe come together very quickly
• In hindsight, I would make two salamis. One was awfully big and difficult to handle.

(Insert off-color sexual innuendo here)

Serves 1-? depending on how long the conversation goes, how freely the drinks flow, and how many like white chocolate. Next variation will utilize dark chocolate and a different variety of fruit and nuts and be equally delicious.

What do you bring to the table for long conversations with old friends?