A Birthday Bash For A Deserving Mother And Her Friends
Menu:
Cheese, Salami, Crackers and Fig Jam
Arugula Salad with Parmesan and Croutons
Sauteed Rainbow Chard with Toasted Pine Nuts
Roasted Yukon Gold and Red Potatoes
Lamb Wrapped in Parchment with Fennel
Brownies with Ginger Ice Cream
Tonight we put on a party for Molly 2's mom. It was her birthday and as a present we that we would love to do a dinner for her and her friends. There were nine total, which doesn't seem like a large party, but it was our first time cooking and plating for
more than four. If it had been a buffet style dinner it would have been much easier, but Molly and Molly wanted a challenge and the experience, so we decided to take the road less traveled.
The first order of business, weeks ago, was figuring out what the menu was going to be. Just around that time we made the "Mollys had a Little Lamb" dinner, which we loved. It was an easy choice to do the lamb. The packets that you make for the recipe are fun to open and great entertainment for party guests. The sides are simple and a delicious accompaniment.
We wanted to keep the appetizers simple since the dinner was bound to be rich. There is a wonderful cheese shop in Berkeley called The Cheese Board, which carries hundreds or even thousands of cheeses. You can literally spend the entire day there tasting cheese, which they are happy to sample. The staff is so knowledgeable and enthusiastic, that it makes dull grocery shopping enjoyable. We ended up with two Spanish cheeses, and one cheese from Switzerland. Unfortunately the wrappers were thrown away so we don't know the names. However, the Spanish cheeses were similar to a smoked Gouda and a Bucheron, and the Swiss cheese was like a mild Beemster. The salami was a hot coppa from Magnanis that balanced well with the smooth, fruity, cheese.
The lamb packets were the most challenging aspect of the night. Even though we had made it before, the number and volume of packets we were making was much greater. We started preparing all the food an hour and half before we wanted dinner to be ready. In the past our timing for dinners has been slightly off so we wanted a cushion for error. Everything was going great, and we were so confident that we had knocked it out of the park until we cut into a piece of lamb ourselves. The meat was raw. The packets were already out on the table and we looked on in horror as the guests were cutting into their own lamb loins. Embarrassingly we had to offer to cook peoples meat slightly longer if they wanted, but they were all very polite and declined. It turned out that the lamb was flavorful regardless of how well it was cooked, and that in fact they liked the tenderness and rareness of the meat. Our big mistake was not letting the lamb rest before we cooked it so when it went into the oven it was still cold on the inside and thus needed to cook for longer. We learn something new every time we cook.
The dessert Molly 2 made the day before keeping in line with our previous learned rule: make dessert first! It was a chocolate brownie with black currant and hazelnut chocolate chunks. Earlier in the week she made a similar batch, but had used old chocolate and found that it is very important to make sure the chocolate you use for cooking is not expired. Who knew chocolate expires. The ice cream that went with it was a simple vanilla ice cream with candied ginger mixed in. The flavors were sweet and spicy with hints of fruit and decadent chocolate. It was a huge
hit.
Overall the dinner was a success. There were many things that the Mollys learned and will do differently in the future. Although, they were disappointed with various things, they are perfectionists to the core, the party goers loved it and couldn't have been happier. It doesn't hurt that they got to go home with a party favor. (Cute jars filled with ingredients to make ginger snaps.)
Links:
Vanilla Ice Cream
Brownies
Candied Ginger
Italian Comfort Food
Menu:
Ragu Sauce
Hand Made Pasta
Fresh Baguettes
Arugula Salad with Beets
Tonight's dinner was all about warmth. We wanted to make something that reflected the cold weather and warmed us up inside. (Something besides the wine.) Originally we thought stew, which we'll probably make in the future, but then Molly 1 found this amazing Ragu recipe so we decided to give it a go. After all, Ragu is traditionally, in a sense, an Italian stew.
For this meal the Molly's shelled out some dough for a pasta maker. Usually we don't advocate buying kitchen supplies since were financially unstable... but this seemed like a useful investment. Molly 1 was in charge of making the pasta and ragu.
The ragu was so simple. Literally chop the veggies, brown the meat and then let it simmer while you prepare the rest of the meal. The pasta however, was a nightmare. Molly 1 doesn't have a large food processor so she had to alternate between mixing in the smoothie blender and a Cuisinart food processor from 1989 (not even kidding). The next steps were very simple to follow and the pasta maker was easy to assemble and use (we got ours from Bed Bath and Beyond). The only advice we give is to make sure you have a large food processor and to use regular flour instead of wheat flour.
Molly 2 made the baguettes, which, unfortunately, turned out more like baseball bats. The recipe was easy enough to follow, but for some reason, they were not light and fluffy like described, but dense and doughy. The flavor was fine, and once drenched in stew you couldn't tell that they were as hard as hockey pucks, but in the future we would recommend using a more complicated sourdough recipe for baguettes, rather than trying to make them in one day. It's probably well worth the effort.
Regardless of the missteps, the meal was exactly what we wanted, warm and cosy.
Menu:
Chicken Tenders
Tater Tots
Honey Mustard Sauce
Ranch Dressing
Chipotle Ketchup
Strawberry Ice Cream
Bread Pudding
Caramel Sauce
Every Thursday we bowl, by "we" we mean Molly 1 bowls while Molly 2 visits the bar and her denture wearing friend. After many hours of bowling Molly 1 works up an appetite and craves chicken tenders from the grease pit cafe attached to the bowling alley. Those grease filled pockets of joy were our inspiration for tonight's dinner.
The first items that the two Mollys made separately were the desserts. We decided that it is best to make the desserts first. That way the dessert can cool or set or you know firm up.
The strawberry ice cream was ridiculously easy. I (Molly 1) had just been gifted an ice cream maker, which does all the work for you. Most ice cream makers come with an instruction booklet that has recipes to follow, however I used one that I got online that was no cook, no prep, just shove it in there. The ice cream tasted amazing, but did not have enough time to freeze. MAKE YOUR DESSERTS FIRST!
The bread pudding was easy; the end. The one tweak I (Molly 2) made on the recipe was using Hawaiian Sweet Bread and toasting it before pouring the sauce over it. Also I made a really easy caramel sauce that took literally 7 minutes and turned out divine.
Next we made the untatered tater tots. The recipe was a little confusing to follow and we stumbled our way through it learning that with tater tots you either have to deep fry them or they're not tots. The way we cooked ours was to pan sear them, getting all sides brown and crispy, and then putting them on a baking sheet and throwing them in the oven for twenty minutes. They were more gregoire-ish to be nice, but in reality they were like the dense knishes from central park. The one highlight was that they were seasoned to perfection.
So many sauces. We made ranch, Molly 1's favorite all time forever sauce, honey mustard, and chipotle ketchup, Molly 2's favorite sauce for everything including rice topping for breakfast. The sauce recipes were easy to follow and we found that we had a majority of the ingredients already on hand.
Chicken good. I am happy. Thanks to the Neely's down home cooking recipe, the chicken was the star of our meal. It was juicy and light and crisp, exactly how chicken tenders should be. We were pleasantly surprised that the chicken turned out so well since neither of us have ever cooked fried chicken before. We tweaked the recipe because we forgot the cayenne pepper and instead used more of an Italian style seasoning, which was harmonious with all of our dipping sauces.
As a side note the two Molly's went on a hiatus for two weeks without blogging. We did make a chicken pot pie and Korean food, but had one too many to write the posts. :-)
Overall this meal would be our second favorite that we have created thus far. (#1 Indian!!)
Recipe Links:
Chicken Tenders
Tater Tots
Ranch Dressing
Chipotle Ketchup
Strawberry Ice Cream
Bread Pudding
Caramel Sauce
