The Wind Attack

Having been overwhelmed with work seven days a week over the last month, I started feeling like I was neglecting many of my friends. It is often time hard to balance work, cooking and biking with social activities, and still have time leftover for, I don’t know, sleeping?

So I figured it would be fun to have a dinner party to catch up with friends and share some of my recent culinary discoveries. Plus it is always fun to practice for cooking for more than one, as there are always difficulties with timing and execution when creating a lot of food in a small kitchen.

As an appetizer, I started with some oil braised garlic prepared in the garlic roaster I had recently purchased from a ceramicist at an art fair. The piece is shaped like a garlic bulb providing a chamber for roasting the garlic inside. Rather than roasting the whole bulb, I braised the peeled cloves in California Extra Virgin Olive Oil. This idea came from The Artful Vegan, a cookbook I recently received as a gift. A sprig of fresh rosemary and a pinch of sea salt and you’re on your way to not only some yummy roasted garlic, but ridiculously flavorful garlic rosemary olive oil.

I served the garlic and oil with some french bread, and local sheep milk feta cheese. This offered hands on action for the guests, taking pieces of bread, spreading them with cheese and garlic, then drizzling them with the oil.

This appetizer was followed by two course of pasta. Dividing a single recipe of pasta among a full table of guests makes for smaller serving sizes and therefore a chance to sample more than one dish in an evening.

Mushroom Fennel Ragu

The ragu takes a while to cook, and I made the mistake of not starting the cooking process until after we had finished the appetizer. It would have been perfect timing if I had the sauce simmering while we were munching on the bread, which would have created very little wait time between the first and second course of the meal.

In any case, the dish was a fun follow up to the appetizer, offering some exciting flavors and al dente pasta. I served them up in the ravioli shaped stoneware bowls that I made last winter, adding an element of fun whimsy to the meal.

Creamy Fall Fettuccini

Immediately following the ragu, I whipped up a batch of Creamy Fettuccini with Butternut Squash and Kale. Having steamed the squash and prepared all of the ingredients ahead of time, it was a snap to whip this up. I decide to serve the creamy sauce second, as I felt it would be a better end to the savory portion of the meal.

After this, we were all quite stuffed, but I had planned a simple bit of dessert. Organic grapes from the farmer’s market, a sliced up California Pomegranate and a dark chocolate bar laid out on the cutting board made for a casual, sweet and light ending to the meal.

Naturally after all that, I wanted to leave the kitchen a disaster and just fall asleep contently, but alas, there are responsibilities! Good thing I have friends that are willing to help with the clean up!