Valley Grove, One Year Out

We spent the afternoon celebrating and planning for the wedding, which is now just less than one year away.

We ate lunch at Chapati, our old favorite Indian restaurant in Northfield. They have a buffet for lunch every day, and we have been talking (joking at first, now talking) about having them provide the catering for the wedding. They are relatively inexpensive, close, and have great food. The trick is to get Indian food, without having it be an "Indian food" wedding. So we ate through everything in the buffet and think we have a good idea how we could make it work using Chapati as the main source of food, and then supplement with extra salads and such from elsewhere. The trick is to get food that is not too spicy, and not too sloppy. Of the food we had today, here is what we thought would work:

• Tandoori Chicken. A bright red yogurt marinated chicken with very mild spices that is baked. Everyone likes their Tandoori Chicken.
  
• Lots of Naan flat bread with their mango (sweet), onion (medium hot), and green (hot) chutneys. Everyone likes Naan. 
  
• Lamb Sabzi. An chunky onion curry made with spices that we really liked. It was a little sweet and very festive with hints of cardamom.
  
• A vegetarian dish. We didn't think any of the ones we tried today would work. The only thing close was the Chicken Palak, and well...
  
• Mango pudding, and lots of fresh fruit. Yum. 
  
• Chicken and Veggie Pakora. Think of really good fried chicken fingers and veggie nuggets. Thats what they are. 
  
• Of course lots of basmati rice

That's about all we would get from Chapati. The rest would be things from other places like salads, both the leafy and hearty kinds, along with all the deserts and drinks. I don't know if this would be more or less difficult, but we really think it could work well. 

After lunch, we went over to Valley Grove to see what things would be like this time of year. The answer was yellow, very yellow! The prairie was awash in three distinct and very yellow flowers that are very beautiful. The photos we took look a little brown and green, but in person it is a field of yellow.  There is also a smattering of some blue and white flowers, and wild berries that round off our gigantic bouquet.  It was 83˚ and sunny today, but also really windy so it felt nice and cool. But I can't imagine a tent holding up to that wind, the St. Olaf wind turbine even had to shut off! 

The last two photos are another idea of ours. It is a photo of the Big Woods state campground about 1 mile away from the church. For $50 we can sleep 16 people, with $3 a person more after that, up to 32 people! I said before that this wedding was going to be a rock concert, but this would really make it so! Anyone interested? We can reserve any time.