Lunchtime Goodness

Look at this! Life is good when you can mosey over to the fridge for a bite and come out with this kind of goodness. Fresh Torta bread drizzled with olive oil, draped with a big, fat, fresh basil leaf, topped by mounds of Prosciutto (Parma Ham)- accompanied by organic cherry tomatoes and a perfectly sweet & sour plum. None of this would be possible without our trusted CSA (Be Wise Ranch) and the unexplicably leery coworkers at Rockwell Collins, where my husband works. See, they had their annual international potluck lunch the other day and the engineering group was asked to bring something "European." Of course, I only learned of this continential cuisine requirement the afternoon prior to the event: "I need you to make some kind of European dish and bring it in by 11 AM tomorrow!" Excuse me? I was still wondering what was going to show up on our dinner plates that night, let alone lunch tomorrow. Anyway, long story short, I had a melon, a pound of good fresh mozzarella, LOTS of tomatoes, and a thriving basil plant. You know where this is going...So I made Caprese Salad and picked up some Prosciutto to put on the melon for a beautiful and rather common Itallian Antipasto- hors d'oeuvres that you may see on almost any Itallian menu; hors d'oeuvres that I ate a million times in France, anyway. Well, it turns out that the personnel at Rockwell Collins weren't so fond of the Prosciutto. The Caprese salad was familiar and therefore 'safe', and that went down without a hitch, but the melon and ham- well, that was just downright scary to some. Charlie overheard comments like: "Oh! That's just wrong- in so many ways" Nobody touched the stuff. I felt kind of bad for Charlie, like maybe it was embarassing that he was the one to bring in the offending ham (raw [salted] meat on sweet melon! My God!) He even admitted to me at this point, that it was kinda wierd. So the entire dish was a waste, but luckily for me, I bought a double pack of the Proscuitto and the other half has been waiting for me in the fridge. Until now. Buon Appetito!