le sauce

a lazy, sunday, spaghetti dinner party

The lazy, Sunday night, spaghetti dinner party. That wasn't.

I am selling this to you as the dinner party that you make for friends on a Sunday night, when you want to be surrounded by loved ones who will surround your dinner table and everything is cozy and nice and easy. It's a menu that's casual and meant to be hardly any work at all. Lots of one-bowl, one-pot, one-tray stuff. And it is. Honestly.

Until it wasn't.

I'm not bragging when I say I've thrown a dinner part or two in my time, more complicated than this. I'm telling you so you understand why I can't understand how I screwed this up so royally on a recent Saturday night when I had friends over and I burned the sauce, forgot to add cream to a simple batter for the dessert, and almost had to order a pizza to save dinner. My kichen looked like a tornado hit it and my two friends, regulars at my house for dinner, were like what the hell is wrong with you tonight. They weren't being unkind, they were asking honestly. They saw how simple the 3-ingredient sauce was to make. It needs almost no monitoring. It's just, like with, oh anything else, you don't want to accidentally leave on a high heat forever so 1/4 of it burns to a crust on the bottom of your pan. We still ate it, by the way and  it was still delicious--it's that forgiving despite incidents like this. So I was essentially serving them spaghetti and a salad and it didn't go so well. What can I say except sometimes, I have one of those nights?

But if you're not having one of those nights--the nights where if you'd left the house you would hear the whistle of the anvil falling to meet your head as you turned the corner of your street--this is the easiest, laziest dinner party ever. It's also 100% comforting, devour-able, and worthy of your best friends. It's the one to serve your best friends, to encourage that Sunday night gathering, when we're all busy getting ready for the week and don't know if we can get together. Get together. Just read your horoscope first. If it warns you to stay in bed, that's the only time this one might not work out for you. 

a lazy, sunday, spaghetti dinner party (all the recipes you need, below)

nibbles: fried olives and fried leek chips*

marcella hazan's famous tomato sauce* and crazy spaghetti

burrata with pumpkin seed pesto and chiles

wild arugula salad w/ parmesan snow

chocolate banana stuffed french toast pockets, with maple syrup and cream

*Previously published on le sauce.

an indulgent, deep-winter dinner party

(and a guide to help you pull off the night perfectly!)

There are those dinner rituals reserved for winter, the ones that involve an extra-stuffed grilled cheese sandwich, chowder, hot chocolate--sometimes all in the same night. I'm all for those. This menu, however, is nothing like those dinners. Even more indulgent, melted in butter, tossed around in cream, topped with crispy caramelized things, this menu, rather than embracing and cozying up to winter, is about defying winter with a dinner party. It's about setting a fabulous table with the holidays long past, dragging your friends out of their homes 3 hours after the sun's set, putting on nice shoes and rewarding yourself for not letting winter beat you down. It's celebration just for the sake of it, and a justifiable rich balance to flat, grey February.

So I give you:

an indugent, deep-winter dinner party menu...

risotto-stuffed chard bundles with browned butter oyster mushrooms

cauliflower in leek cream

sauteed brussels sprouts with fried shallots & toasted almonds

domino potatoes

banana cream pie

...and the guide to help you pull it off with ease!

a biryani feast

I don't know if my parents failed to mention that we would be having a dinner party or if I was to busy concentrating on the television to register the news, but I remember "discovering" that we would be having company as a child on certain evenings, and having only a short amount of time to get ridiculously excited before guests arrived. I loved that dinner parties meant having "friends" over to play with but even then I also loved everything else that came with entertaining, including the telltale signs that led me to the discovery of the events themselves.

For instance, the house would be tidied and prettier than on a normal day, with special table cloths wooshed over a table and every light in the house burning even before dusk. Records replaced the radio. I was scrubbed clean, made to wear something too nice to play in and actually encourage to sit and watch something on TV rather than run around. And the commotion in the kitchen was different too. The energy was palpable. Maybe there'd been crabs scurrying across the kitchen floor earlier in the day, maybe a caramel flan was setting in the fridge, but I didn't make the connection from those things, actually. But once I caught whiff of a biryani coming together, I knew for sure it was a special night, with special visitors to pamper and plump on their way.

To this day, regardless of how much my immediate or extended family toils and creates in the kitchen, I've never seen biryani envoked for anything short of a birthday or entertaining guests. I would never think to request it for dinner, even to this day when my aunt asks me what I would like to have when I'm planning to visit--see, I'm not a "guest" so a request for biryani simply never even crossed my mind. It has nothing to do with the effort involved--I assure you that whatever my aunt does whip up for my casual visits is much more intensive. Biryani, and it's traditional, expected if not required accompaniments, are simply reserved for a very special dinner. I hope you have both the occasion and inclination to make this feast one day soon--and somewhat often too.

(Happy new year.)

a biryani feast (all the recipes you need, below)

jackfruit biryani

spiced, fried potatoes

cashew nut curry

mint chutney*

pickle*

curried beans*

fried eggplant curry*

*Previously published on le sauce.

 

the menu: a rustic thanksgiving

It's just a draft for now, but I'm pretty sure I've settled on a rustic menu for Thanksgiving this year. Mushroom pies for sure, and really simple sides like Parmesan-roasted squash, crispy, shredded brussel sprouts with almonds and creamed mustard greens. There's a custard that I'm making for dessert, mostly because I want to share the recipe with you, and I'm debating on whether I have the guts to make a wild blueberry pie.

To start, I'm making a beet pesto on goat-milk Gouda crackers (see, I'm baking something!), my aunt's leek chips and (if I can get my hands on them), deep-fried shishito peppers that we can snack on with cava and elderflower sidecars. Easy but still special, I think. If you're hosting Thanksgiving this year, have you figured out what you're making? Not everything I've mentioned has an actually recipe attached to it, I just feel like throwing the ingredients together and coming out with what I think sounds good. I hope you're taking a fun approach to your menu too--I'd love to hear about it.

Keep an eye out for a roundup of Thanksgiving-worthy recipes that I'm getting ready for next week, if you're still looking for inspiration.

 

the menu: backyard eats

I did make a couple of things ahead of time last Friday, but mostly, drinks in the backyard with friends was a very casual affair. Thankfully, a holiday weekend is straight ahead and if you're planning to put out some food to graze on as you sit outside, maybe this menu will provide some inspiration. Enjoy your long weekend!

mid-summer nights' lazy lounging

tomatillo + avocado salsa -  white bean purée - fried eggplant - crostini

union square café nuts

crispy, fried leek chips (recipe to come!)

ice cream cones - ice cold beer - lots of white wine

 

the menu: custom fit

I'm always appreciative when hosts make thoughtful meals for me at dinner parties--I always require a meat-free meal, and sometimes I'm the only one around the the table with that requirement. I've had them either make creative substitutions wherever they're serving meat in the meal, make an entirely different course for me, or skip the meat altogether. The latter puts the most onus on the host, but it also makes the guest feel the least self-conscious, since their preferences are not singled out.

That's the approach I take when I have guests over who have specific meal requirements--for several reasons. I strive for a meal that everyone can enjoy, making as few versions of any course as possible. That means they feel like I haven't gone to a lot of trouble, because I really haven't. Win-win.

I'm sure you've had to get creative to make your guests feel welcome too and I know it can seem challenging.

My advice is to think of what people can enjoy, rather than what they can't. Because I love menu-planning, this approach has added merit for me, since it keeps the focus on the rewarding part: creating a delicious experience for everyone. If the dish that initially comes to mind doesn't fit your needs, move on to the next great thing you might make. If a recipe almost fits the bill but has one ingredient on the no-list, perhaps there is a perfectly good substitute for it.

Most recently, I made dinner for myself and five guests who could not eat meat, gluten, soy, cow dairy or garlic. We ate for hours and I think everyone truly enjoyed every dish, judging by their compliments and second helpings. I don't think anyone felt cheated and certainly no one felt singled out. We just had good night breaking bread together. Well, minus the bread, of course. Ha. 

dinner with friends

black olive tapenade - seed crackers - fried fava beans - cava

james' winter stew (with green onions and shallots instead of garlic, coconut milk instead of milk) - jerked tofu - rice & lentil pilaf with caramelized onions - spiced goat yogurt sauce w/ cilantro, mint - riesling - pinot noir

ice cream sandwiches (store-bought gluten-free, vegan cookies and soy vanilla ice cream) - coffee & liquor

the menu: girls' night in

I think I've mentioned before that I basically throw dinner parties because I want to be at a dinner party. Is there any better way to spend time with people you love than eating, drinking, talking and laughing indulgently for hours on end? Not for me.

However, that wasn't the only motive behind the "Girls' NIght In"-themed  dinner I hosted a couple of months back. I wanted to create and shoot something bigger and more special than I could have pulled off without a team, so I enlisted the help of my best friends in the first ever collaboration on le sauce! Steph and Sue were my co-hosts and James agreed to shoot the process while my hands were full cooking--there's even video, which I will share with you whenever I finish editing!

The idea behind the theme was not to make something precious or pretty, it was to create a menu full of the foods women tend to appreciate. For instance, I think it's usually my girlfriends and I who want to order from a cheese board at the end of a meal, and we have a deep, deep appreciation for butter, don't you think? Sue, Steph and I tested and tweaked recipes for weeks, and hosted some of our closest girlfriends for dinner as James ran for the hills politely excused himself from the house. The results were even better than I'd hoped and we all had a great time, probably no one more than the hosts. Steph is now a pro-pasta-maker and Sue can safely say she has exhausted the ways, natural and non, to create the reddest red velvet cake. I had an amazing time working with my best friends.

I'm excited to finally share the recipes from Girls' NIght In with you all this week! Look for them every day. The only two I won't be bringing you are the recipes that are not le sauce originals: for the pasta dough we followed Lidia Bastianich's recipe, from Lidia's Family Table, and Cook's Illustrated's red velvet cake recipe.

For now, the Girls' NIght In menu and a few pictures I took that night. Enjoy! 

The menu...

bon app's food-lover's cleanse (or why i love magazines)

Speaking of cleanses, Bon Appetit's Food-Lover's Cleanse is pretty brilliant. 2-weeks of all of the thinking done for you, complete with pictures, a printable recipe book and handy grocery list, and the rules of the game. If I wasn't obsessed with my own menu-making, I might use this. If you hate planning your menu for the week and if you're trying to detox (or just eat healthier) and still eat well, you should check it out. It's not revolutionary but this whole package is really well done. It's why I love magazines.

My stomach growled a lot yesterday and the fun part of me is already mad at the controlling part of me for this whole no-wine thing. But other than that, I'm doing fine. How about you?

the menu: thanksgiving

i got up early this morning to set the table--for tomorrow's dinner. i always leave that task to the very end, when i've completely run out of time, and regret it, so this time i'm starting early. as you can see, i succumbed to the lure of overpriced, inedible decorative gourds at the grocery store. but when i saw them i envisioned a place setting that looks kinda like this. what do you think?

and if you're celebrating thanksgiving this weekend, how are your preparations coming along? are you hosting or bringing a contribution to a meal? i really do love to hear about dinner party menus, so please share yours in the comments if you care to. i think seeing a full menu can be inspiring and give a real sense for how a nice night unfolded, so i'm introducing a new, perhaps bi-monthly post on the blog where i share some menus from taco night, a gin + grey gardens premiere and other parties i've had or am having. first up, thanksgiving of course. 

this year james and i are hosting my parents, aunt and cousin--a small group--and we're doing a pretty standard menu incorporating those great fall harvest vegetables in the market right now. because we don't eat meat, a root vegetable (potato, parsnip, celery root, yam and leek) pie will be at the centre of the meal. the year before, however, we hosted almost 20 of our friends at a sit-down thanksgiving dinner! we took a slightly different twist with that fall menu. i've included both below, in case you're still looking for some last-minute ideas.

wherever you are and however large or small your feast or gathering, i hope it's one you enjoy very much and one that makes you thankful. happy thanksgiving.

 

harvest menu

pistachios - saint agur bléu with quince jelly - champagne

roasted root vegetable pie - sage & chestnut stuffing - creamed potatoes - garlic butter peas - broiled corn with za'atar browned butter - tamari gravy - apple relish (james' family's preserves!) - pinot noir

espresso chocolate cake (courtesy of my mom) - banyuls

 

friendsgiving menu (2009)

goat milk gouda - comté - la sauvagine - banana peppers in oil - beet-pickled devilled eggs - cava

mushroom farro pie - caramalized corn with mexican chili powder & cayenne - porcini fried rapini - buttermilk mashed potatoes - pinot noir

cakes + pies supplied by gracious guests - port

 

holiday entertaining: dinner & cocktail party menu ideas...

...and my thanksgiving dinner for 17!

when james and i went to bed on friday night (well, saturday morning at 1.30ish), we felt pretty good about the big dinner party we were throwing on saturday night. the house was clean, the groceries were bought and about half of the cooking complete. i was especially pleased with the table i'd set--with the dinner table we normally use as our desk brought down from the den and saddled up to our actual dining table, i was just able to fit 14 patio chairs and place settings all around. it wasn't until a very clever 5-year-old walked into the kitchen at 7pm on saturday, where we and at least 3 friends were furiously cooking (despite my estimation that we'd be done all of that and on to our 3rd drinks by then), and pointed at each of us and counted "...15, 16...17!", that james and i really thought we might be in trouble. oh. 17 guests, not 14...uh huh. quick-thinking james pulled apart the two dining tables, we squeezed in a few more chairs on the extra side we'd gained, and our dining room got just a little cozier. what would holiday entertaining be without a little craziness, right?

the dinner party menu

but put aside my lack of time-management and basic math skills, and you have a menu that was entertaining-friendly because the recipes each have portions that can be made in advance. i served a mix of my own recipes like hot banana peppers in chili oil and the porcini-fried rapini recipe i shared in my last post, and ones from gourmet (what am i going to do without you, gourmet??) including the mushroom farro pie which i've served before and is a beautiful and worthy vegetarian main dish. and, just for me, i worked in a few recipes that paid homage to my recent meals in brooklyn: deviled eggs were on few menus there--these ones were too pretty in pink to pass up, and there was buttermilk in everything from the salad dressings to the trendy buttermilk-fried chicken...so into our mashed potatoes it went. it was a high-flavour, comfort-food spread we intended for the friends we feel most comfortable with. 

cocktail party menu!

and we really do have amazing friends. they helped cook, clean, even play host at our own house that night at times. still, i don't know in how much of a hurry i'll be to have almost 20 for dinner again. (soooo in denial about the 26 people coming over for the family holiday party that it's our turn to host in 3 weeks....hi james!) the next time, i think cocktails are in order. i rounded up some recipes i've posted over the past year that would work perfectly as hors d'oeuvres over cocktails or as pre-dinner bites.

• wild-mushroom wontons are the perfect finger food for any occasion. 
• lidia's panelle, cut into smaller triangles, can be dipped into chutney, pesto, hot sauce or just about any condiment you have on hand. 
• old-school but ever-popular, quiches, made mini, are endlessly customizable always get devoured. 
• my good friend, may, (who gave birth yesterday to a lovely little girl, bryce!) tested this mushroom and rictotta toast recipe but spread it onto smaller toasted baguette slices and commented on how it would make a great appetizer. i agree! 
• my mother often serves these fried chickpeas to guests. i think they'd be perfect with a (few) glass(es) of bubbly.
• and if you're serving any south-east asian patties, samosas or filled/fried delights, you must pair it with my dad's green chili sambol--prepare more than you think you'll need! 

as promised, this month is all about entertaining and i'll be posting some new recipes, edible party favours, host(ess) gifts and even some party tips--ones that i may even follow one day. if you have favourites--tips, recipes, gifts, please let me know! i would love to know what you keep in your entertaining arsenal. till then, cheers!