That last post was not exactly blogalicious. To make it up to you, here is a super-easy fig thing, so easy it's almost not even a recipe:

Halve your figs from top to bottom. In a cast iron pan, heat up a good big bloop of olive oil, a smaller blop of good organic salted butter, & a few drops of balsamic vinegar. Then sear your figs face down (meaning the sliced side down) until they start to caramelize a bit & get nice & hot all the way through. Take em out & put them face up on a plate. Crown each half with a morsel of strong-flavored goat cheese. A cheese with a little bit of funk to it. We used buche: edibly toughened rind, gooey inside the rind, crumbly & milder in the center. I wouldn't use the cream-cheese-type goat cheeses because I think they don't have quite enough flavor to balance the sweetness of the figs, but you could try it, maybe with the addition of some rosemary or the like.

Anyway, there is a popover option which transforms this dish into a whole brunch. You can make popovers (we used Mollie Katzen's recipe) & then while eating them, put a cheesy fig half inside each bite of popover. Obviously put the popovers in the oven well before doing the figs, so the timing works out. Yummm!

Eating is much better around here now that Donna's show is up. Can I just say, she kicked ass with this installation. I'm so proud of her! Go see it, you won't be sorry.