“What’s Galentine’s Day? It’s only the best day of the year,” Leslie Knope says during the 16th episode of the second season of “Parks and Recreation.”

Since that fateful episode, Galentine’s Day has been celebrated by friends one day before Valentine’s Day in an attempt to honor and celebrate the love of friendship. 

This year, I decided to host a small Galentines get-together in the form of a waffle brunch for a group of my friends.

We decided to celebrate our friendships by making desserts together, watching movies and hosting an impromptu brunch.  

We started at noon, but since it was Super Bowl Sunday we only had five hours to spend (time with friends is never enough). 

I had envisioned the waffle-making process to be an easy job, but it was extremely messy. Too many cooks spoil the broth, as they say. Surprisingly, the waffles turned out very well. Clearly, the recipe we used was foolproof…or there was enough pink food coloring to disguise any burns; (I credit the food coloring, and name it the star ingredient of the day).

Yes, prep time with five friends in the kitchen took 45 minutes (30 minutes longer than my normal time when I cook waffles solo). Yes, the kitchen counter looked like a rainbow had thrown up on it. But pink waffles were eventually prepared, strawberries did eventually get cut out in the shape of hearts and everyone eventually received a glass of pink lemonade. So, it was a small price to pay for a delicious, homemade brunch.

In addition to the waffles, I laid out a charcuterie board, macarons and Harmless Harvest’s pink coconut water.

Since it was snowing, we wanted to spend a fun day indoors and decided to watch a movie. With one friend being terrified of comedic thrillers and another friend being a horror movie enthusiast, our only other option was a Disney movie. We went with “Encanto.” 

We set up a projector in the attic, but around halfway through, two of us were asleep and the rest of us were engaged in a conversation that made us miss what critics say was the most diverse Disney movie of all time.  

  In retrospect, our Galentine’s day was a small, messy, inelaborate, and perfect get-together. Galentine’s day is a great excuse to find the time to simply destress, spend time building important relationships and create fond memories.

I highly encourage you to gather all your friends and empty store shelves of pink food coloring. Just make sure you choose a truly riveting movie that was recommended by someone other than your 5 year old sibling. 

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Photo by Kiswa Khan '23