I quickly tried to hush her and took her out into the lobby. Stares from old grouchy women and judgmental people who forgot what it is like to have a 2 year old in church were plenty. Towards the end of mass when Leah and I were still in the lobby of church, I saw Nick peek back at me through the glass doors and I signaled that Leah and I were heading home… hopefully to wear her out on the walk so she would at least behave the rest of the day.

When everyone got home, we did our best to try and recover from the scene at church. Putting back on our happy faces, we went outside and let the kids find the eggs in the yard the Easter Bunny had left for them. Things were looking up and all was well for the rest of the morning! A small blip in the morning at church, but we recovered. I was feeling confident… yay us!

“Yay, us!” lasted until about 1pm that afternoon. Nick and I spent most of the day cooking, getting ready to welcome our good friends and neighbors over for a late Easter lunch / early dinner. It was at about 1pm…one hour before our guests were to arrive… that Nick put the pork loin into the oven for me. He then said, as he was checking the recipe to see what the timer should be set at, “You realize this has to cook for 2 hours?” Uh oh… I had hungry guests coming over in just a short while and I had completely misread the cooking time on the recipe! There was no away around it… our guests were going to be here and dinner would not be ready. Not a stellar move for this seasoned hostess!

Everyone got here and you know what? We made due. We sliced up one of the two loaves of homemade bread and shared it with Kerry Gold Butter. We munched on fruit and the deviled eggs my friend contributed. The kids played together, we chatted and all was well. Of course, would you believe that 2 hours later when the timer went off Nick went to check the pork loin and it was overdone! Ah well… it all still worked out and we had a delicious meal with our neighborhood family / friends.

The moral of my entire post is… best laid plans often don’t turn out the way they were meant to, however, there is absolutely nothing about yesterday I would have changed in the end. We enjoyed hanging out with some of my favorite people, were treated to a gorgeous day, a delicious meal, and our many blessings.

Yesterday was all about savoring the moments… the pork loin mishap and the walk home from church required me to slow down and take things in. Just like Limoncello… a drink that is not meant to be guzzled but slowly sipped and enjoyed as you savor what is going on around you.

This recipe is my husband’s handiwork (the Limoncello) combined with a recipe I learned about when traveling to New Orleans with Zatarain’s earlier this year. The head chef of the John Besh restaurant, Domenica, let us enjoy creamy Limoncello, then went on to share what to do to turn regular Limoncello into creamy Limoncello.

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Homemade Creamy Limoncello

Creamy Limoncello (the non-creamy Limoncello was originally blogged on this post)

Author Dine & Dish

Ingredients

• 10 lemons
• 1 750-ml bottle vodka
• 3 1/2 cups water
• 2 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 can sweetened condensed milk

Instructions

• Using a vegetable peeler remove the peel from the lemons in long strips (reserve the lemons for another use). Using a small sharp knife, trim away the white pith from the lemon peels; discard the pith.
• Place the lemon peels in a 2-quart pitcher. Pour the vodka over the peels and cover with plastic wrap. Steep the lemon peels in the vodka for 4 days at room temperature.
• Stir the water and sugar in a large saucepan over medium heat until the sugar dissolves, about 5 minutes. Cool completely. Pour the simple syrup over the vodka mixture. Cover and let stand at room temperature overnight.
• Strain the limoncello through a mesh strainer. Discard the peels. Transfer the limoncello to bottles. Seal the bottles and refrigerate until cold, at least 4 hours and up to 1 month.
• Before serving, pour prepared Limoncello and Sweetend Condensed Milk into a large pitcher. Whisk together until well combined. Serve very cold. Refrigerate remaining Creamy Limoncello.

The post Not As Planned {Recipe: Homemade Creamy Limoncello} appeared first on Dine and Dish.