A dinner party

When I arrived at the office the last work day before Christmas, I came in and saw my desk heaped with gifts. It took me by surprise, as it had been so long since I had worked in an office. It hadn't even occurred to me that we would exchange presents, and I  had nothing planned. But it came to me quickly: I would have everyone over for a dinner party. I thought an evening together, away from the ringing phones and stress of the job, would allow us to remember the privilege it is to have such fantastic co-workers. It was just what we all needed.

Menu:

A cheese board to nibble on as we waited for everyone to arrive and for the soup to finish.

Soup: French onion 

Salad: A variation on this salad (I served it with bottled dressing and no avocado)

Main course:  Pork Tenderloin with hoison sauce, fingerling potatoes and green beans.

Dessert: Gelato with a pirouette cookie and a raspberry on top

Once I decided on French onion soup (which involves making a complex broth, caramelizing onions, which translates into a lot of time), I chose to simplify the rest. I bought salad dressing when it was taking too long to find the ingredients for the salad dressing in my recipe, I made a sheet pan dinner that could cook all together while we were having soup and salad. All I needed to do was get up briefly and remove the pork, put it under a foil tent, and let the beans and potatoes finish cooking. Our dessert was as simple as scooping ice cream, grabbing a boxed cookie, and adding a fruit garnish. 

My boss brought a fun gift that kept the conversation going after the meal was over:

Chat Pack: Fun Questions to Spark Conversations

Sample questions we discussed: 

What is the fastest you have ever driven?

What is one sport you don't care about at all?

What is the best speech you have ever heard?

Lots of laughs, plenty of new insights into my co-workers. I look forward to having this as part of future dinner parties.

My keys to dinner party sanity (especially one, like this one, that is during the work week):

1) Accept help. 

My youngest son has been eager to earn money while he is home on break from school, so I hired him to deep clean the bathroom, make sure the floors and rugs were clean in the great room, and to tidy up the front door deck area.

My co-worker Sarah came early to help with last minute prep.  She also stayed until all the dishes were done at the end of the night. My house was spotless and sparkling when I went to bed. 

2)  Think through what needs to happen when. Don't serve things that will require that you be away from the party for long stretches. Your guests would rather visit with you than see you as a blur in front of the stove. A sheet pan dinner is a perfect solution.

3)  Set things up ahead of time -- and go ahead and use all the pretty things. I put out the china and the silver. I used the crystal goblets. I put out the linen napkins. Simple elegance (the "simple" part can be translated in the top photograph as "wrinkles."  I love beautiful things, but I am happy to have it be less than perfect. It helps put people at ease.)

4) Start the evening with an empty dishwasher and an empty dish rack. Clean up as you clear each course. I put the soup bowls in to soak, thanks to all that baked on Swiss cheese goodness.

5)  Remember that a dinner party is not to impress anyone. It is to put everyone at ease and to help them relax and recuperate.  As author Shauna Niequest says:

“I’m not talking about cooking as performance, or entertaining as a complicated choreography of competition and showing off. I’m talking about feeding someone with honesty and intimacy and love, about making your home a place where people are fiercely protected, even if just for a few hours, from the crush and cruelty of the day.” 

- Shauna Niequist, Bread & Wine: A Love Letter to Life Around the Table with Recipes -

6) Candles and twinkle lights make any set up feel like a party.

7)  Music can be a good icebreaker. I will often start an evening with my George Winston Pandora station, letting it go quiet when the conversation gets lively.

FINAL ADVICE (as cliche as it might be): JUST DO IT.  You won't regret it.

A wedding reception menu

I was asked by my dear friend Lisa if I would be willing to provide food for the California reception for her daughter Kate who was getting married in Chicago.  It was a tricky time of year (December 22nd), but after a few days of thinking about it, I agreed. Lisa is a gem, and I wanted to bless her and her family.

Now the greatest thing about providing food for a gathering at Lisa's is that she is not a micromanager. She chooses people she trusts, and she lets them go. I had a budget, I knew the food needed to be finger food, but other than that I was free to choose. Very fun!!  She did not ask me what I was serving until I arrived at her house the morning of the 22nd. She really is trusting!

I'm not sure how anyone planned these kinds of events before the internet, and I am well aware of how much Pinterest came to my rescue. I spent a few relaxed evenings obsessing over possible menu items. Finally, just a few weeks before the event, I had the menu plan.

Here is what I was working with:

100 ish people
Not a ton of room to work in the on-site kitchen
She was hoping to stay under $1400 for all the food and drink (I was not doing desserts or drinks)

Here is what I came up with:

Hoisin sauce meatballs

This recipe was the inspiration for this entree, but I ended up cutting all sorts of corners. I bought pre-made meatballs at the Grocery Outlet (they were even "Italian Style") and bottled hoisin sauce. I put that in a crock pot and called it done. They were DELICIOUS. Sprinkled with sesame seeds, served with toothpicks.

Chicken salad in cucumber cups

I changed the chicken salad recipe a little, adding grapes instead of the cranberries and apples. Again: DELICIOUS.

Ham and cheese sliders: followed the recipe. I will make these over and over. I cannot emphasize how incredibly easy and tasty they are. We premade them, wrapped them in foil, and then just kept heating up new batches until they were all gone. Lisa has a lot of football players and their families in her circle of friends. Those boys were very happy with piles of sliders.

Pork tacos with lime slaw
By far the biggest hit. This was the recipe, I believe, that caused two people to ask for my (non-existent) catering business card. The flavors are so good. I served leftovers at church the next Saturday and our friend Greg said it was the best taco he had ever had.

Cheese tray
Grapes, a hard cheese, a goat cheese, brie, pickles, nuts, bread and crackers. Beautiful to look at, flavorful to taste, easy to assemble.

Cut veggies in cups with ranch dressing at the bottom of the cup (didn't start getting eaten until everything else was gone. Poor veggies.)

Charcuterie tray

This post from Reluctant Entertainer was the inspiration for this tray. I did not include tortellini. We used fresh mozzarella, salami, sliced turkey, pepperoncini, cherry tomatoes on eight-inch skewers and drizzled them with balsamic glaze. Again, they were easy, they were beautiful in their display and so delicious. We put a basil plant in the center to finish off the design.

The tray is the larger one in this picture from Pier One (fortunately I have a friend who works there and was able to use her 40% discount. Not an inexpensive purchase, but I know I will use it over and over.) I did line it with parchment paper, as it is not a food-safe surface.

I purchased skewers, ziploc bags, foil and food.  The final cost:  $500 for 110 or so people.  There was just enough left over for a few meals for Lisa's family. All in all: a great success.  I did my shopping at Grocery Outlet and at WinCo.

A few notes: I did make an orzo salad and a green salad, but I realized as I was doing the final preparations that they were totally unnecessary. I was right. I deducted the cost for those items from my bill, and brought them home to enjoy. I think I was just nervous about amounts, but we were spot on with how much we served.

For the prep:

I had two friends who came and chopped and sliced for me the night before, plus my son Brennan came along and emptied the trash, the dishwasher, and swept up my messes as we went along. While they did those things, I put the pork on to cook, made chicken salad, and packed the boxes for travel. I could not have done this without their help.

The day of the event I had help from one friend of Lisa's who was incredible. She powered through prep and I ended up having an hour to put my feet up before the event began. My husband was our server, while the two of us just kept prepping and putting things out from 6:00 - 9:00. John had so much fun serving, he is suggesting we do this when we retire. That makes me smile.

May the marriage of Kate and Adam be as joyful, as beautiful, as full of love as the evening of December 22nd. It was an unforgettable night to be a part of.

Easy (Really!!) Parmesan Basil Crackers

Easy Parmesan Basil Crackers

Highly recommended, especially with hot soup on a cold night. A delicious little biscuity cracker.

Yumola!

Kitchen Vignettes on PBS

 

 photo credit:  Kitchen Vignettes.  Isn't that incredibly beautiful?

With great thanks to Carol, I now know about Kitchen Vignettes on PBS.

Strawberry Basil Tart? Cherry Tomato Galette? Very cool music and quick moving video? Yes, yes, and yes, please!

I'm hooked.

25 years of teaching celebrated

Our dinner party last Tuesday was in celebration of three men and their careers.  My husband and two of his co-workers have been teaching for our school district for twenty-five years each.  And they love their jobs and their students.  Amazing!  A great reason to celebrate.

It was a four-course event that I cooked for and one of the other wives hosted.  Taking a dinner party on the road is both fun and challenging;you have to be organized enough to have everything you need, but you don't have to clean the bathroom.  It was a great choice for this party.

First Course

Roasted Tomato Basil Soup by Two Peas & their Pod

(My version included roasted peppers.  I also added a dollop of cream, two homemade crackers (recipe below), and finished with fresh grated parmesan and bits of fresh basil.)

Easy (really, they are!) Parmesan Basil Crackers

Second Course

Winter Salad with Roasted Beets and Citrus Reduction Dressing

(One of my favorite salads.  So simple.  Great flavors.  Full disclosure:  not one of my husband's favorites.)

Third Course

Roast Stuffed Pork Loin with Port Sauce

(My version used the directions for the pork and the stuffing, but I replaced the cherries with figs and made a port and fig sauce.)

Roasted zucchini, potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, mushrooms on the side.

(Drizzle with oil, generously season with salt and pepper, and roast at 400 degrees until done.)


Fourth Course

Peach halves, sprinkled with cinnamon and nutmeg, and put under the broiler until hot and bubbly, but not burned.  We served it with whipping cream, a handful of blueberries, and then a bit more nutmeg and cinnamon.  Would be just as good with ice cream.


It was a great meal and terrific evening of reminiscing!

Stuffed Gypsy Peppers

Our weekly box from Farm Fresh to You has included gypsy peppers the last few weeks, and we also had a bag of mini peppers from Costco beginning to beg to be used, so it was time to find a good recipe for peppers. I roasted some for future use, I added some to a pork chop recipe for bright color and added flavor, but the bonanza moment came when I found this recipe: Cheese-Stuffed Gypsy Peppers.    Here are the ingredients:

6 gypsy peppers or small bell peppers

3/4 cup cream cheese

1 1/2 cups feta cheese

2 cups cooked basmati rice, chilled

3/4 cup golden raisins

1/3 cup chopped mint

For the vinaigrette:

1 to 1 1/2 pints cherry tomatoes, halved

2 to 3 tablespoons minced fresh basil

1 tablespoon minced flat-leaf parsley leaves

3 tablespoons rice vinegar

1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1/4 cup sliced almonds, toasted

2 to 3 tablespoons crème fraîche

For the instructions, please see the recipe link at http://leitesculinaria.com/ 

Modifications I made: I used regular raisins, goat cheese rather than feta, and I had no creme fraiche so I went without it.

The filling of the peppers is mild with the goat cheese, which I loved, and the mint and the raisins are a perfect complement to the caramelized peppers after grilling. The vinaigrette adds the sharp vinegar, the basil and parsley herbal complexity, and the crunch of the toasted almonds.

DELICIOUS!

Asian pear, persimmon, and almond salad

1/4 cup fresh lime juice
1 t roasted almond oil or extra-virgin olive oil
2 T honey
1/4 t. kosher salt
1/8 t. cayenne (This small bit adds quite a kick; I wouldn't want to add any extra)
2 oz. small, whole tender lettuces. (Translated for my kind of cook:  Grab a head of butter lettuce from your veggie box, wash and pick off enough for four salads)
1 lg. unpeeled Asian pear, cut into the thinnest possible wedges
2 firm-ripe unpeeled Fuyu persimmons, cut into thin wedges
1/3 cup toasted sliced almonds

1.  In a medium bowl, whisk lime juice, oil, honey, salt and cayenne until blended.
2.  Mix greens with the fruit, add dressing and toss.  Plate.

Makes four salads

Spicy Beef Cross-Rib Roast with Caramelized Clementine Sauce

* I have been asked for this recipe three times, so I thought I better post it to make it easier to share.  Enjoy!

** I highly recommend the Sunset Magazine Best Recipes 2010 magazine, if you can get your hands on it.  I use it all the time.  This recipe comes from it's dog-eared pages.

Serves 6-8

2 1/2 pounds clementines
1-2 t crushed red chile flakes
3 T coarsely chopped fresh ginger
4 garlic cloves, peeled
1 t kosher salt
3 T veg. oil
1 boned cross-rib roast or boneless chuck roast tied up as a roast
6 T each soy sauce and sugar
3 T dry sherry
3 green onions, cut into 2 in.match sticks

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Finely shred zest from 2 large clementines; save clementines for another use. In a food processor, whirl zest, chile flakes, ginger, garlic, and salt to mince. Blend in oil. Put meat in 12 x 17 in roasting pan, rub all over with chile mixture, and set fat side up.

2. Roast beef until browned, 20-25 minutes. Reduce heat to 325 degrees and cook until an instant read thermometer inserted in thickest part of meat reaches 90 degrees, about 20 minutes.

3. Juice remaining clementines (juice to yield about two cups.) Bring a large saucepan of water to a boil. Add clementine peels and boil gently 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Drain; rinse with cool. water. Scrape out and discard pulp and white pith. Cut peels in half, then stack a few at a time and cut into long, thin strips. In a bowl, combine clementine strips, sugar, soy sauce, sherry and 2/3 cup clementine juice.

4. When meat is at 90 degrees, pour juice/soy sauce mixture around it. Cook, stirring sauce occasionally, until meat reaches 130 degrees for med. rare, 30-40 minutes; as pan juices begin to caramelize, stir in a few T clementine juice to prevent scorching.

5. Transfer beef to a cutting board and let it rest, tented loosely with foil, 15 minutes. Pour remaining clementine juice into roasting pan, set pan over high heat, and cook, stirring often, until juices are thickened and shiny, about 7 minutes. Scrape sauce into bowl. 6. Snip twine from roast. Thinly slice meat crosswise. Serve with sauce and onions as a garnish.

*** Serving this last night I used a chuck roast instead of the cross-rib roast.  For such a great sauce, I shouldn't have compromised, but it was still really good.

Butternut Squash with Spinach and Cranberries

1 medium-sized butternut squash, cubed
1/2 lb. fresh spinach
A handful of fresh cranberries
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Salt and pepper to taste


1. Use a peeler to remove skin from the squash.
2. Cut in quarters, then chunks.
3. Place on roasting pan, drizzle with olive oil, season to taste and bake in preheated oven at 425 degrees for 30 - 45 minutes.

At this point you can store the roasted squash in the frig until you are ready to make the final dish.

4. Toss into cast iron skillet with some finely chopped garlic and sauté for a few minutes, until it begins to soften.
5. Add spinach and continue to saute for another minute or two, until spinach has wilted.
6. Add cranberries and toss, cooking for another minute.
7. Plate and serve.

Colorful, flavorful, simple.  Highly recommended.

Vanilla

Thanks to the inspiration of my oldest, I am beginning to think more deeply about making things from scratch.  She brought me a cute little blue bottle full of vanilla for my birthday, and I was thrilled.  A blue bottle alone would have been a great gift for me, but vanilla to boot?  Yumola.

But I haven't begun to use the extract yet for fear that it would be gone with a blink.  I comforted myself by starting my own vanilla batch.  I took an old beer bottle from an ale I found at Trader Joe's, I scraped off all the labels, and voila!  I have my vanilla bottle.

~ my bottle's brief foray into the afternoon light...it is now a prisoner of the dark ~

It is hard to even refer to this as a recipe, but here you go:

Three vanilla beans, cut open carefully so as not to spill one little vanilla bean. 

Insert into a bottle.  

Cover the beans with vodka.  

Close the bottle.  

Shove into the dark corner of the cookbook cupboard (or any dark corner will do.)  

Wait impatiently for vanilla to happen (approximately 3 months.)  

Shake the bottle every now and then.  

Enjoy!

Rehearsal dinner recipes

There were some requests for recipes from the meal at my son and daughter-in-law's rehearsal dinner last week. Here are the links and/or the recipes:

Man-Pleasing Chicken

I cannot say enough about this chicken.  It is FANTASTIC.  And easy.  And has few ingredients.  And really delicious.  Highly recommended.

Mediterranean Chicken

I love lemon, garlic and olive oil together.  So simple, so fragrant, very moist.  Yum.  Garnish with slices of lemon.

Orzo Salad  (with special thanks to the bella Valeri Harper)

1 ½ cups orzo

¾ cup olive oil (divided ¼ cup, ½ cup)

9 oz. frozen artichoke hearts, thawed

½ cup chicken broth 

1 large egg yolk

2 T white wine vinegar

1 t Dijon mustard

2 T minced fresh basil

2 oz. prosciutto minced 

2 oz parmesan, grated fresh

2 T fresh lemon juice

¼ cup minced fresh parsley leaves

4 scallions minced

In a kettle of boiling salted water, cook orzo 7-8 minutes, or until al dente. Drain in a sieve and refresh under cold water. Drain orzo well and toss it with ¼ cup olive oil in bowl. In a saucepan simmer the artichokes in chicken broth until they are tender, drain well and add them to the orzo.

In a small bowl, whisk together egg yolk, the vinegar, mustard, salt and pepper to taste. Add ½ cup olive oil in a stream, whisking, until dressing is emulsified. Whisk in the minced basil and pour the dressing over the orzo mixture.

Add prosciutto, parmesan, lemon juice, parsley, scallions and toss.

Asian Slaw

I could live on this salad.  The only thing we changed was to garnish it with peanuts.

Green salad 

Romaine lettuce

Greens from Costco

Mini cucumbers

Mini peppers

Lime Vinaigrette

Caramelized Onion Rolls (with thanks to Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day)

The general idea with these rolls is to make a standard batch of dough (I used the very basic master recipe), and then make rolls instead of a loaf.  Once the rolls have risen, you sprinkle flour over their tops, cut a "x" on the tops, then fill that top with caramelized onions.  

We caramelized the onions with the following recipe:

3 T olive oil

2 lg. onions

1 t salt

1 T white vermouth

1 t white wine vinegar

2 T brown sugar

1 t dried thyme or oregano (we used a combination)

4 T water

Heat the oil, add the other ingredients and cook until fully caramelized.  The recipe says 25 minutes, but we made such an expanded batch that it took much longer.  The fragrance of onions caramelizing is heavenly, especially with the addition of vermouth.

Cobbler in a Jar

I used the frozen berries (raspberries, blueberries, blackberries) from Costco.  We used the half-pint jars and then topped the cobbler with vanilla ice cream.  The link above is one recipe option.  We looked at several and I cannot remember which one we used.


Strawberry Lemonade
Beautiful color!

Iced Tea (using Iced Tea Syrup...not sure if this is the recipe used, but it is a good one.)
The hard working kitchen crew made this with mint, and it was fantastic.


We made as much as we could on the day before the rehearsal dinner, and then Carol and her angels took over and did the final steps and delivered a masterpiece.  I am grateful beyond words to my dear friend.  I can only hope that someday I will be able to serve her so willingly.  Carol and Curt, you are my inspiration!

The ULTIMATE Cook Book's Granola

I have a lot of cookbooks, but this is the one I use every single week.  It is my go-to source for granola and pancakes, salad dressings, soups, fancy meals and simple family fare.   They offer great options and variations on their recipes, which means I can make granola even when I don't have a specific ingredient; I can just swap one sweetener for another or use different nuts to get a different flavor.  HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.  It's even on Kindle. 

A road map for The Ultimate Granola with my own variations

1) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
(They recommend toasting oats in the oven before mixing with other ingredients.  I skip this step.)

2) Mix one item from each of the following two lists in a small saucepan set over medium heat:

Sweetener: 2/3 cups of any of the following

Honey
Maple syrup
Cane syrup
Agave nectar

(I use mostly honey and a little maple syrup; you can also use thawed apple, grape or cranberry juice concentrate, but I haven't tried that)


Oil:  2/3 cups of any of the following

Walnut oil
Almond oil
Canola oil
Safflower oil
Grapeseed oil

The moment the sweetener/oil mixture starts to steam, take the pan off the heat.  Stir in:

1 T vanilla extract


As the liquid mixture cools, mix all of the following in a large bowl:

6 cups rolled oats (not quick cook or steel-cut)
1/2 cup wheat germ
1/4 cup light brown sugar
2 t ground cinnamon
1 t salt

Also add one item from each of the following two lists:

1/2 cup nuts, seeds or coconut

Finely chopped walnut pieces
Finely chopped pecan pieces
Chopped unsalted cashews
Sliced or slivered almonds
Unsalted shelled sunflower seeds
Shredded unsweeted coconut

(I actually use sliced almonds AND coconut)

1/2 cup fortifier

Powdered dry milk
Powdered fat-free dry milk
Powdered fat-free dry whey

(In my latest batch I used 1/2 powdered milk and 1/2 malted milk powder)

Once the dry ingredients are well stirred, add the sort of cooled sweetener/oil mixture.

Grease two large baking sheets, divide oat mixture between the two baking sheets, spreading it to the corners.  Place the trays in the top and bottom thirds of the oven and bake for 10 minutes, stirring once.

Reverse the trays and continue cooking until lightly browned and fragrant, about 10 minutes more, tossing and stirring once or twice.

Remove from oven.  At this point you may add 1/2 cup dried fruit to each baking sheet. 

(I cook this at 300 degrees and for a longer time, watching carefully that it does not burn on the edges.  I have been known to get distracted and let the granola burn (not a favorite taste for my family!) so I keep the temp lower to avoid that.  My family also really dislikes chewy granola, so I make sure I stir it well and cook it long enough for the entire batch to get crunchy.)


What are you waiting for?  Go, buy The Ultimate Cookbook.  Click the image above or this link to get to amazon.com!

St. Patrick's Day menu

Irish Soda Bread

This recipe has cheddar cheese and butter and garlic in it.  It is FANTASTIC.  FYI:  I used Kerrygold Cheddar, but I used good ol' American butter.  It was the best soda bread I have ever tasted.

Guinness Stew

The best smelling stew...make sure you can stand over the pot for awhile after you pour in the stout.  Yumola.

Rehearsal dinner fun ala pinterest

The world of pinterest found me at just the right time in my life:  Rehearsal Dinner Time!  I have found terrific recipes to try AND cool DIY projects for everything from burlap place holders to colored glass candle holders.  I am having way too much fun.

Stay tuned for more brainstorming.  Final decisions will most likely come way too close to the date (which is June 28th...our 26th wedding anniversary!)

Some of my favorite ideas at this point:

Source: 4men1lady.com via Diane on Pinterest

Source: the-girl-who-ate-everything.com via Diane on Pinterest

Source: blueeyedbakers.com via Diane on Pinterest

Source: weddingchicks.com via Diane on Pinterest

Source: tastykitchen.com via Diane on Pinterest

Source: gimmesomeoven.com via Diane on Pinterest