Getting the great opportunity of a fabulous meal!

Well, this is the first post! Yay! As we start to prepare for going to Lebanon we will post more.  Last Saturday we went to visit my family. My wonderful parents catered a Lebanese meal so we could have the kids try some food! The laughter was plentiful, the food was awesome and the games were fun! We also had the chance to meet my sister's neighbor who is from Lebanon. The biggest thing I got from talking with Alex is that once we are there, we won't want to come back. He then gave us some fabulous treats. One was a homemade baklava type dessert and the other was made out of pistachios. Yum! Here are some pictures of the meal. Hopefully I can also explain what it is! Sorry if the spelling is off.

 Above is Sheesh Taouk - basically chicken shish kabobs. Everyone loved these!

 Dolmathis - Grape leaves filled with ground sirloin, rice, herbs and onions. Not everyone liked these but I sure did!

 The whole family right before we ate.

 Kibbe - Ground sirloin stuffed with pomagranite and pine nuts, Fatayer - pastry stuffed with spinich, pine nuts and raisins, Spanakopita - pastry stuffed with feta cheese, spinich and herbs.

 We had three different dips, above is the Baba Ghanouj. We also had Hummus and Tsasiki all with pita bread, olives and pickles.

 Sparkling Pomegranate juice which apparently is common there. Very sweet. We also tried some Lebanese red wine. A little sweeter than the red from here but good. I think it would have been better chilled.

Tibouleh salad - Steamed couscous, chickpeas, tomatoes, onions, and bulger wheat in a cumin garlic vinaigrette. This was really good!