Dinner on the fly…

I am blessed to have friends that love food and cooking, while at the same time being reasonably tolerant of me. 

I have said often on these pages that the best dinners are sometimes those involving the least amount of planning. A few ingredients picked fresh that morning, maybe a quick trip to the butcher, and everything else already present and accounted for in the kitchen or pantry – nothing more is required. Saturday was one such dinner, and I should hasten to point out that I had very little to do with making it happen.

Here We Are

Who would have thought this game,
this flame would still be burning
Who would have guessed that all these blenders
would still be churning
Not even we on our bended knees
could have ever blessed it
Not even I with my head in the sky
could have ever guessed it
“Here We Are”, lyrics by Jimmy Buffett from Take The Weather With You

In the heat of summer and the midst of the madness, I sat back for a moment to drink it all in. Kevin probably said it best, decked out in his Hawaiian shirt with a beer in his hand surrounded by 20,000 like minded individuals. “This is my happy place.”

Saturday Night Improv Dinner

The whole idea that gave birth to the Supper Club was dinner shouldn’t have to be complicated. A quick check of respective kitchen inventories, a few recipes culled from memory or cookbooks at hand, and a trip to the grocery or Farmer’s Market for the rest. Time to table is kept to a minimum, and Saturday night was a perfect example.

More Pictures from High Hope Steeplechase 2009

Click here to read about the party that almost wasn’t.

More pictures from our annual tailgate party at the High Hope Steeplechase in Lexington. The pictures are from Lori Back, Sarah Speakes and yours truly.

The Party That Almost Wasn’t

Mardi Gras in May Tailgate Party - Winner "Best Food" 2009 High Hope Steeplechase

Click here for more pictures from this year’s High Hope Steeplechase Tailgate Party.

Finally, it’s over. Not just the tailgate party itself, but the whole start to finish preparation, execution and clean-up. The kitchen has begun to resemble a kitchen again instead of a war zone. I can actually see inside of the refrigerator. There is space in my freezer. And most importantly, when I came home last night there was absolutely nothing that I needed to do. The nap I chose to take in lieu of making catering plans, felt really nice. The announcement that we had won the “Best Food” award came in mid afternoon. Many high fives were exchanged, hugs were given, toasts were made. The party had, for months, started to resemble a cat slowing working it’s way through it’s nine lives.

The Trial Run

When discussing food or cooking in general, the conversation and focus of attention is usually on the food itself – it’s taste and presentation – as it rightly should be. But there is another extraordinary side to any good meal, particularly one that involves multiple courses or, even more remarkably, one that has to be prepared in one place then transported and finished in another. When hosting a large event, especially one that has been ongoing for almost a decade, people tend to come hungry and with certain preconceived notions about how it’s all going to look, feel and taste. Newcomers have heard the stories, like “Oh you should have been here two years and tried the …” or even more flattering “We’re still raving about last year when you cooked…”. That’s why you do it, why you put the effort into it, why you foot the bill. Throwing it all together at the last minute would be unthinkable. More than your own reputation is at stake, you have the expectations of your friends to live up to. Being barely successful would equal failure. The only option is to consistently, year in and year out, raise the bar. In the end, it all comes down to logistics and timing.

Dinner: Apology

Being friends means never having to say you’re sorry. Sorry as in “Hey I’m sorry I didn’t make it over for dinner as planned causing you to wait for hours while growing ever increasingly hungry before finally heading off to bed with no food whatsoever in your belly leading to a fitful night’s sleep as your blood sugar eventually bottomed out around 3am in the morning.” You know, that kind of sorry. But I’ve jumped ahead a bit too far in my story – let me back up a little first.

Christmas in the Caribbean

“Ho, ho, ho and a bottle of rum
Santa’s run off to the Caribbean.”
Jimmy Buffett

I’m sure if one were to spend Christmas in the Caribbean, dinner would be nothing like the menu below. However, being as I am in Kentucky, this will at least give enough of the island flavor to a holiday feast to get us by. And after all, it’s better than turkey, right?

A Meal to Be Proud Of: Cancer Benefit Dinner Auction

My favorite kitchen apron, ready for action.

“So, what do you think about being auctioned off for charity?”

It was my neighbor Charlotte who was asking the question, and while it was in no way a display of any lack of trust in her, I was for some reason immediately afraid.

“Auctioned off for what exactly?” I asked, visions of being sold to the highest bidder for a blind date with a blue haired widow of the equine set parading through my head – definitely not my cup of tea.

“We’ll offer to cook dinner for 6 at the winning bidder’s home,” she replied. “It’s to benefit a cancer charity at work.”

They say every addict has an enabler – someone who, consciously or not, encourages and even facilitates the person’s behavior in question. For me, in the culinary sense, my enabler is Charlotte.  

Bond-ing for Dinner: When the World (and a Meal) Are Not Enough

I’m probably one of the few members of my generation who got to know the world’s most widely known secret agent through literature rather than the movies. I still read Casino Royale every year, so I was thrilled when a decent adaption of the book was finally filmed and released in 2006. It was while watching the news one evening that I heard the anchor talking about the rush to book wedding dates for the “luckiest date of the century”, July 7th, 2007. Seven is lucky number in Chinese culture, and the three sevens in the date were attracting couples the world over to tie the knot the first week of July. It was as the date 07/07/2007 scrolled across the screen that it hit me, with every bit as much force as a lethal toe kit from Rosa Klebb’s KGB issued shoe. Oh seven, oh seven, double oh seven. It was, I thought, the perfect set-up for a dinner party. I knew then that I would be planning a dinner for that date and all of the food would be from or inspired by James Bond. It would be an evening, to put it frankly, of Martini’s, Girls and Guns.