cheese and pate dinner

yesterday after watching some dvr'd episodes of unwrapped off the food network on canned foods and cheese, we were inspired or should i say suckered into getting some cheese and crackers and canned meat. now obviously, the meat was not for me. i told my boyfriend to make things simpler by limiting us to 2 cheeses. he decided to go for a semi soft and semi hard cheese. his decision was to get manchego and herbed chevre. he went for the manchego because it his favorite all purpose cheese, and despite his adoration for it, i have somehow never managed to have it before. manchego is a sheep's milk cheese and can only be called manchego if it is made from manchega sheep which originate from la mancha region of spain(sound familiar like don quixote). our local bloom carries it for $18.89 a lb. needless to say we got quite less than a pound. i love goat cheese so i was glad that chevre was his second choice. for his canned meats, he got liver pate, lobster pate, and deviled ham. all the canned meats were approxiamately $2 a can. the deviled ham was the original inspiration. the show mentioned vienna sausages which he had never had. i remember as a child having vienna sausages and hating the slimy juice they came in. but, i did remember liking deviled ham. when i looked online, all explanations seemed to be that it was finely diced ham and seasonings. he thought well that sounds good, and he wanted to try some. he also got some gardenia, pickled spicy vegetables instead of the usual olives to accompany our spread. and, of course, we need a bread so he bought some seasame crackers and boxed crostinis(who knew they made these? what a time saver for parties.).

the results. the cheeses were absolutely divine as expected. the chevre fabulous as expected and the manchego has an almost nutty quality to it. it was a 3 month old wheel, but we really can't afford to get one that is more mature as those are even pricier. i was also pleased at how full i was after what might be seen as a course in many other meals. the meats did not go as well. the lobster smelled like lobster at least which is a bonus as the other two cans smelled like bad cat food. he made me smell them much to my dismay. i guess my memories of deviled ham were off cause he was less than a fan. the liver pate was so bad that even the cats would not eat it when we put it in their bowl. it was still sitting there the next morning. i suppose thats what you get when you buy cheap. all in all a nice change of pace and a lovely chance to feel like you are living th decadent life.