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In a few weeks one of my girlfriends is having a birthday cocktail party and I am helping her get it all together. It is not going to be too big, and we both love to cook and entertain, so it seemed natural that we would make all the goodies rather than cater.
A bonus when you do it yourself, you can splurge on better ingredients and better booze, rather than that extra going to someone bringing in the food.
And while the gathering will be intimate, it will be a bit decadent too. It is after all, a “big” birthday and smack in the middle of holiday season. And really, what’s wrong with a bit of simple, comforting decadence? Nothing, if you ask me!
One of the little nibbles we were thinking of is a truffled mushroom toast. My lady lives in Venice, and therefore Gjelina is obviously one of her faves. They have a fab-u-lous mushroom toast with hen of the woods, creme fraîche and truffles. Out of this world. So I wanted to channel that, but as a neat bite-size canape. (The real deal can be a huge, albeit good, mess).
Mushrooms and truffles go together beautifully – both woodsy and earthy, but while mushrooms (especially basic button and cremini) can be humble, a bit of truffle butter takes them over the top. Sliced truffles would add even more to that – but we aren’t going that far. Thankfully, truffle butter has actual bits of truffles, as opposed to the oil, which is just flavoring.
So this past weekend I did a trial run. Sliced the mushrooms super-thinly and sauteed them s-l-o-w-l-y with shallots, butter and oil. Once they were melt-in-your-mouth soft and golden, I took them off the heat and stirred in a touch of cream to make them more velvety and then a (good) bit of truffle butter (maybe a tablespoon).
Heavenly, I tell ya!
For the base, I cut triangles out of a rustic loaf, and baked them until slightly golden. I didn’t add butter or oil because I didn’t want it to compete with the goat cheese that was going to be added, and that may have been a mistake. Something was amiss.
As for the goat cheese, I folded in a bit of cream, to make it more spread-able and to tone down the tanginess of the cheese – to not fight with the silky mushrooms too much. Again – wasn’t quite right.
So – dear readers – please help. I know all the components are there and the truffled mushrooms are just right, but any ideas for the goat cheese crostini? How can it better compliment the mushrooms?
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!
xxo
With Thanksgiving weekend coming to an end and Christmas right around the corner, I thought I would share with you five things that are making me happy right this minute.
And that doesn’t include the fact that my pants still button after all the festivities or things I am truly thankful for, just little things that are making me smile.
1. That I finally remembered to force paperwhites in time for Christmas. If you still want to plant them, or have been planning on it and just haven’t made it happen yet, it’s not too late — if you go for it right now. Here are some tips from Lauren at Pure Style Home to help you out, if need be.
2. That there is some smoked salmon in the fridge, for a break from turkey.
3. That my vision for the Thanksgiving table turned out just how I was hoping it would.
Thanks to a quick trip to Britex Fabrics, the Flower Mart having plenty of white and yellow flowers even if I showed up at the end of the day, and a crafty mom who figured out how to make the fabric work so I could play with the flowers. And …
that the flowers still look good today!!
4. That we made quite possibly the best ice cream that I have ever had – this Bourbon ice cream from Bon Appétit via Lottie and Doof. I am a bit nervous knowing how easy it is to have it in the freezer at all times.
5. And that we scored a few little finds on at the Flea Market with mom. Four milk glass compotes and a set of not-quite silver (silver plate, but I really like the color and weight) with super-long forks that I love.
Hope you have enjoyed the long weekend that that you have plenty of things that are keeping you happy!
xx
Last year while in NY, I made my first Thanksgiving without adults (I hope you don’t think I include myself in that category – ha!). My friend Meg and I whipped up a fabulous spread for friends who were staying in town – it was wonderful – both in taste and fun!
This year I am doing it again, except the help in the kitchen will be my mom. And I can’t wait! We are breaking in our new place with Thanksgiving AND house guests – so it has been a busy weekend getting it all together.
As for the menu, here is what we are planning. Just in case you are still looking for ideas – or have suggestions for me.
Butternut Sqaush and Apple Soup
- A little first course action to whet the appetite.
- Either with herbed croutons or herb popovers, depending on time and stress
Dry-Brine Turkey & Gravy
- This is how I did the turkey last year & it was the favorite amongst even self-proclaimed side-lovers. It is basically the same method as my favorite roast chicken, just salted earlier and cooked longer.
- For the gravy, get some turkey wings, back, etc. and make stock today so it is done and ready to go by Thursday. Makes for THE BEST gravy!
- I have never tried oyster stuffing, but it seems like something I should have made. Plus, there is a great little oyster shop down the street from me, and it may be the perfect place for lunch out of the house on Wednesday, while picking up the PRE-SHUCKED oysters. (Since they won’t be eaten on the half-shell, I can do things like that).
- Any tips for a first timer with oyster stuffing? (And yes, I know, guests should get tried and true recipes, and they mostly are – I just can’t help it!!)
Mashed Potatoes & Celery Root with Crispy Shallots
- I love the addition of celery root to potatoes – gives it a nice freshness that can be helpful with such a full plate.
- The crispy shallots are á la Ina, and add a nice textural component.
- An old favorite around here
Kale Salad with Persimmons and Apples
- A new favorite. Plus, it is great to have something a bit lighter and with crunch amongst everything else.
- Still deciding on dressing – vinaigrette vs. walnuts and blue cheese. The blue cheese is obviously tempting, but goes against that whole ‘lighter’ note. Thoughts?
Cranberry Sauce – two ways
- Homemade with a touch of orange and ginger. (Here is a fun play on the combo if you are looking for something a bit different).
- Ocean Spray with the ridges – you just have to!
Pumpkin Pie
- Not for me, but I think it is a requirement on the table – no?
Apple and Cranberry Crisp with Pecans and Bourbon Ice Cream
- I prefer crisps and crumbles to pies, so this one is for me. I am just gussying up a standard apple crisp with extra pecans in the topping and chewy tart cried cranberries in the filling.
- As for the ice cream – bourbon as the star? YES PLEASE!
Whew – I think that is it. Am I missing anything? What are you planning?
One of these years I want to do a super-traditional Thanksgiving, and by that I mean ditch the turkey in favor of lobster. Have you done that?
xx
I did not cook what you see here. I wish I did. Because it was damn good.
This past weekend Catie and Jimmy had a few friends over for a little end of summer dinner. And to say we feasted on summer’s finest would be an understatment.
It was one of those lovely dinners that just happened, with everyone helping to get things done, but nothing was so difficult that it required a recipe or couldn’t be made with vino in hand.
Catie and Genevieve brought out all the stops. Fresh tomato sauce made with local heirloom tomatoes and finished with basil and parmigiana served over fresh whole wheat linguine from the farmer’s market. Heaven.
Boy – I have really made this linger. I didn’t mean to, I promise, but sometimes that’s just what happens, ya know?
When we first started thinking about the dinner, I knew that we wanted to have a menu that was super simple. Things that required little to no cooking so we could really just enjoy being up at the lake for the weekend and not spending the whole day in the kitchen. Even so, dinner for 20, no matter how simple, takes at least a bit of time.
Thankfully we have awesome friends (who are great in the kitchen & out) and everything came together by committee.
What I was undoubtedly most excited for were the tomatoes. I had seen a few fun posts on Style Notes focusing on summer tomatoes (a tomato tasting from Martha Stewart and a tomato bar during cocktail hour at a wedding) and knew right away lots of heirlooms would be key for a low-stress summer dinner.
I thought it would be fun to highlight the different varieties will a plethora of salts and oils. Sometimes cool salts can be pricy, but when purchased in bulk (and without fancy-schmancy packaging) you can get some great finds at even better prices. We loaded all the salts (plus local crushed chiles and freshly cracked black pepper) in the little dishes from Chinatown and set them out in little grouping among the table for everyone to sample.
We had:
Because who doesn’t like pictures of a good table? I thought I would share with you some snapshots and details from Saturday’s (rained out) dinner.
Tables, chairs, dishes, glasses & flatware – collected from the house – which gave for a nice mix & match look.
Flowers and vases – Flowers were bought at the Tahoe City Farmer’s market on Thursday (and kept in a bucket of water until Saturday) and then arranged that afternoon. If you can call it arranging. Really the stems were cut short and plopped into these great little svalka cups from Ikea.
Napkins – my favorite dishtowel napkins, tekla, also from Ikea.
Menus, place-cards, salt labels & oil tags – For the menus, I used paper that I had leftover from backing the invites (Paper Source A7 notecards in papaya). The place-cards were also from Paper Source (in night) and for the salt labels and flavored oil tags, I just cut down extra place cards. All of the writing was done with white calligraphy ink.
Salt dishes – picked them up in Chinatown for a song.
Serving dishes – was finally able to break out some of our wedding gifts and put them to good use. Most of the bowls and trays were Vietri Incanto and Mary Jurek.
Water pitchers & decanters – my favorites (and also wedding gifts) from CB2, the beaker glass pitcher and the botella decanter.
Tablecloth – actually just 8 yards of a heavy, but inexpensive fabric from Walmart (a surprisingly great stop for good-priced fabric, especially when you are in a place where you aren’t sure where the nearest fabric store is). It was perfect for this dinner because it covered 3 tables and when it got stained from the bleeding paper in the rain, it didn’t matter.
Tiki torches – picked up last minute from CVS for a little added light.
–
I think that is about it. Up next - the food … and after the rain!
Images taken by B as I was finishing in the kitchen with friends. I think we may have a new house photographer on our hands.
This past weekend, we had a little birthday gathering for Billy up in Lake Tahoe. During the days, we boated around, played croquet, bocce ball and corn-hole and just tried to soak up as much sun as possible. And considering many of us were coming from San Francisco and strangely-gloomy LA, we really enjoyed that sunshine.
And so moved all the tables and chairs out of the house and set them up for lovely little dinner party out on the yard.
Or so we thought.
A few scattered sprinkles turned into real raindrops. And as the rain quickened the drops grew to the size of elephant tears. Seriously large raindrops – particularly for California. But then it slowed and we thought we could wait it out. There was plenty of wine on the table.
But when the rain changed to rapid-fire hail, we knew it was time to go in.
I have never seen everything broken down and put away so quickly in my life. Or with so much laughter.
But it wasn’t all lost. We were able to eat (albeit quickly) and enjoy and we even got a rainbow before cake. Suffice it to say it was a birthday we will all remember!
I am pretty sure that the Fourth of July is my favorite holiday. I may say that about Thanksgiving too, but I really mean it about both. Probably because they both involve crazy amounts of good food. But the 4th has sunshine! And fireworks! And summer cocktails! And oodles of friends. And well…lots of lovelies (which may account to why I am just know getting to post about it).
I must say that my first 4th in San Francisco was quite wonderful. We gathered with a big group of friends and spent the day grazing and toasting under the Golden Gate Bridge with almost enough sunshine to keep me happy.
And I’ve gotta tell you, our friends pulled out all the stops on the food. Everyone brought something(s) and I made sure to sample it all. Farro with corn, avocado and bacon. Panzanella with fresh peas and asparagus. Radish and mint tabbouleh. Out of this world caponata (currently trying to wrangle a copy of this family recipe). Spinach salad with blueberries. Watermelon salad with feta and mint. And burgers and steaks and sausages. And the desserts, whew, flag cake and lemon blueberry cheesecake bars and chocolate fudge cookies with salted caramel ice cream. Hopefully we can get some guest posts on these things because I want them all to reoccur this summer.
But to start if off, I brought gazpacho with roasted shrimp and croutons. A little something to sip on while the coals heated up and the salads were still chilling out.
Gazpacho is a summer favorite for a reason – it is cold, quick and makes use of one of the season’s greatest gifts – the tomato!
And as much as I have always loved the Spanish soup, I didn’t have a go-to receipe on hand. My friend Audra makes a version that is legendary (from her Basque sister-in-law, I believe), but she was already gone for the weekend, and so I couldn’t get much from her. Thankfully, I did get a text that said “lots of onion and garlic, not blended too much, better if it can sit overnight.”
And that, plus (more than) a little help from José Andrés, set me off it the right direction. I am happy to say I now have a go-to gazpacho.
With the Fourth right and the corner and everyone caught up in World Cup (and Winbledon) fever, I thought we should plan for this year’s BBQ to involve some games.
Whether you plan on celebrating at home, at a park, beach or just about anywhere, here are a few additions to give your celebration a worldly and sporty flair.
The more active among us may vote for a game of volleyball, while I will stick to croquet or bocce – as they are games best played with Pimm’s Cup in hand.
And for those who find even these activities too much – have them man the tunes on the portable record player.
If you still aren’t quite sure where you will be come Sunday, the table in a bag and compact lil’ grill mean you can take your party anywhere.
As long as you remember the prizes for the winners!
Resources:
Since I am sure that the picture on the Memorial Day Weekend post has just been haunting you – wondering when the recipe would be up. Refreshing your browser 100 times, thinking it would pop up. Oh, didn’t do that. Well I can pretend, because that is the recipe you are finally getting.
Cross-country (or across the street) moves don’t generally inspire a ton of cooking, so I’ve been out of the kitchen a bit. Well actually that is not true – there was a taco night and smorgasbord of sandwiches on a sailboat – but those where part of a bachelorette party and the camera must’ve been hidden behind the wine bottle(s).
But at least we still have the clambake.
Before we moved, our friends wanted to have us over for dinner – which sounded great to me. An evening in a fun Soho apartment with an amazing wine collection and a chance to make dinner with great friends. While the boys chatted and kept the wine flowing, we ladies made dinner. Which was so easy it should be criminal, especially considering all the ‘WOWs’ it received.
We started with the recipe for Barefoot Contessa‘s kitchen clambake and then made a few tweaks.
