Birth of a Delicious Idea

In August of 2002, three best friends, Libby, Lindsay, and Melissa, left their hometown of Salt Lake City to explore new and distant horizons during college. Libby ended up the farthest away, attending Brown University in Rhode Island. Lindsay and Melissa both ended up in Washington, but in opposite ends of the state. At the outset of their new college adventures, it was unclear whether or not these three friends would ever find their way to living in the same place again.

Melissa was the first to return to Utah, after conquering college. She went on to get a Master's Degree from a small college in Salt Lake and become a second grade teacher. While her life was good and happy, she secretly hoped that her two best friends would one day find their way back to Utah. At times, this seemed unlikely.

Libby really, really blossomed during her college years, and likely enjoyed college the most out of the three friends. She spent most summers and a semester abroad in exciting locales. After getting a Bachelor's Degree, she headed to northern California to get her Master's Degree at Stanford. During the transition from undergrad to grad student, Libby fell in love with a boy from Massachusetts. They became engaged, got married, and spent some time living together in California. They were unsure if they would move to Utah. However, her husband got hired to work as a professor at BYU, so in spring of 2008, Libby and her husband moved back to Utah.

Two of the three had found their way back to Utah. Only one remained in a faraway land. Lindsay had fallen in love with a boy at the beginning of her college experience. Upon graduating, she accepted a position at a company in Seattle and eventually transferred to Portland to be with her man. They were very happy in their life in the Pacific Northwest, but they, too, decided to move to Utah. Shortly after Libby and her husband made the big move, Lindsay and her fiance (at the time) followed.

The three friends were together again.

But there was a problem. Adulthood had made the lives of Libby, Lindsay, and Melissa much busier than they had been during high school and the long summer vacations of college. As a way to overcome this, the girls devised a plan. They would get together once a month to have dinner together. The girls rotated hostess duties, and the hostess-of-the-month decided a theme for her month. All the girls would contribute something to the meal and all foods served at that dinner would have to somehow fit into the selected theme. Lindsay coined the term Dine-o-Round to name these monthly gatherings.

Although they have certainly missed months, it is always such a pleasure for all the girls to come together with their families to catch up. In addition, many new and delicious foods have been discovered at the Dine-o-Round. The purpose of this blog is to document the themes and recipes enjoyed at each monthly gathering. There will be pictures, highlights of favorite dishes, and commentary on how the foods all came together, among other things.

Enjoy!