A Finger in Every Pie

The Delights of Anticipation

At times I feel as if I have a somewhat limited audience for my culinary efforts.  Don't get me wrong -- I love cooking for G, and he's extremely appreciative.  I mean extremely.  This is a guy who never complains -- even when I put mushrooms in his food.  He just leaves them in a neat little pile by the side of the plate.  And almost every evening, he tells me how good dinner is.  At the same time, he's pretty truthful, and will let me know that he's fonder of some things than of others.  But by and large, he loves just about everything I make, and considers himself lucky to have a partner who likes to cook.  Just as I consider myself lucky to have a partner who likes...well, no, he doesn't like to, but he does them.  Dishes, I mean.  So it all works out. 

But back to this "limited audience" dilemma.  We don't entertain a whole lot, for a variety of reasons, space being among the main ones.  So I really do love it when I have a chance to cook for a larger group -- larger being any number that exceeds us two.  I have two upcoming events:  one is a birthday dinner for my brother, to be held at my dad's apartment.  The other is a dinner to celebrate a couple we know who just got secretly, privately married. 

So I'm mulling over these two possible menus, and would welcome any and all feedback.  Of the various animal protein choices, my sister-in-law eats only fish, so that leaves me with the option of cooking separately for her, or having a seafood entree.  Right now, I'm thinking about shrimp, which always seems festive to me.  So here's the tentative menu for a brother's birthday dinner:

     Asparagus-Leek Soup
     Shrimp and Saffron Rice Pilaf
     Green Salad with Avocado & Meyer Lemon Dressing  (a version of Nigella's Green Fattoush Salad, for those of you who have Feast)
     Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake (again Nigella, How To Be A Domestic Goddess)
     Homemade Mocha Ice-Cream (the bro and SIL gave us an ice-cream maker for Christmas)

And here's the tentative menu for a celebratory dinner for just-married friends:

      Starter Salad: Roasted Beets, Watercress, Goat Cheese, Toasted Walnuts with a dressing of Blood Orange and Walnut Oil
      Roast Duck (I've never made duck at home, and I really want to try); Savory Cranberry/Orange Sauce
      Butternut or Delicata Squash Puree w/shallots, parsley & creme fraiche
      Broccoli Rabe (or some other bitter green) Sauteed with Garlic
      Pear-Cherry Crisp OR Almond Cake with Berry Sorbet

I love playing around with possibilities, especially when it comes to food.  I'm open to all suggestions...

Dessert, Anyway

Last night after a particularly lazy day (I was supposed to fly to Boston for a meeting which got cancelled because of the big snow here, so instead we lay around like bums all day), we went out for a snow walk to at least get outside for a bit, and to pick up a few things for dinner.  Which ended up falling into the "best laid plans" department.

We WERE going to have nice little sauteed filet steaks with shallots and herbs and what-have-you -- steaks which I had defrosted since I want to use them before they get freezer burn -- and I WAS going to make garlic mashed potatoes and broccoli.  WERE and WAS are the operative verbs here, as you can obviously see.  We got home from our brisk icy walk, stomped off on the mat and removed our respective boots, only to  find that our gas had mysteriously gone off and our stove simply had no fire.  No reason for this that we could possibly figure out, after multiple attempts to light the pilot.  So, the landlord's emergency number was called, Con Ed was called, various guys came to our apartment and found that SOMEONE (we still don't know who) had been in the basement and switched off our gas meter, deliberately, sometime between 1:00 (when I heated up some lunch) and 6:00 (when I tried to start cooking dinner).  The nice Con Ed fellows did turn the gas back on and tested everything to make sure we wouldn't blow ourselves up, but by this time I wasn't much in the mood to start cooking. 

So we started calling around for take-out...but our neighborhood sort of shuts down in the snow.  The Indian joint 12 blocks away refused to deliver -- apparently the delivery guys didn't want to ride the bikes in the snow, and were unwavering, despite shameless begging and pleading on my part.  Okay.  The Mexican joint two blocks away didn't answer the phone.  Ditto the Puerto Rican place next door.  In desperation we tried the Mexican-French Fusion restaurant that has just sounded too too strange to even try yet --  but they also had apparently called it a night on account of snow. 

Finally I heated up leftover chili and cornbread for G, ate the chicken and avocado sandwich I was planning for my lunch tomorrow, and then recovered energy and sangfroid enough to make a perfect dessert for a snowy night:

Hot Chocolate with Marshmallows AND Whipped Cream
Crunchy Caramelized Cinnamon Toast

So tonight, thanks to the miracle of fire, I'll make that dinner I didn't make last night.