Saturday, March 29, 2008

Dinner Party # 2

To be fair, I should start with Dinner Party #1. My friend, R, of the biweekly girly crafternoon, and I were discussing that there are always things we want to make that just seem too fancy or too much trouble to make for just two people without a special occasion or reason to do so. They are perennially on our lengthy To Do lists, but they never get done. In order to cross things off our To Do lists, we had ourselves a Dinner Party.

Dinner Party #1

Smoked Paprika Almonds
Vodka Spiked Tomatoes

Shrimp wrapped in prosciutto
Mini crab cakes
Shrimp Toast

Salad with Goat cheese and roasted golden beets

Steak Diane
Mashed red potatoes
Roasted asparagus

Tarte Noir - a bittersweet chocolate ganache tart

We met at the grocery at 3, were at my house by 4 and had dinner about 7:15 after cooking and stopping to graze on hors d'oeuvres and gin and tonics. Delicious, even though I overcooked the steak, and several things were crossed off the To Do lists including Steak Diane and ganache.

Tonight is Dinner Party #2, for LBK's birthday. Some work friends from the old place are coming over, and R is coming, too. JG will be cooking with us this time and we are making his entree, a chicken dish with green and black olives and a sauce reduced with apple juice. Here's the rest of the menu:

Feta puffs
Hummus with pita and red, orange and yellow peppers
Cucumber sandwiches, openface
Mini caprese sandwiches

Greek salad

Chicken with olives
cous cous
spanakopita for the vegetarian among us


Chocolate cake with chocolate covered strawberries and vanilla ice cream, requested by the birthday boy