New Year Dinner with Friends and Family

Phew, it is nice to be back home even though I had a great time being out in SF and miss it every bit. I took the red eye back and gung-hoed it out at work until I must have fell over and slept on my desk. I went home an hour earlier than usual, which is not so bad considering I was unable to sleep at all on my flight due to my aisle seat and super packed flight with lots of babies. Holiday traveling is the worst! However, my colleague's perspective is that she should always book a flight during the holidays just to give up her seats for those hefty vouchers. On the 28th, AA was offering $500 vouchers for those who were willing to give up their seats. Like she said, she just needs two of those to make it to Beijing.

Oh I digress. On a nice Thursday, we decided to host a dinner party with the family and some good friends. It was a total success. We went to the Berkeley Bowl out in Berkeley, of course, to get most of our ingredients. I thought it was a pretty awesome place. The produce was super fresh and I found everything exciting from rainbow swiss chard to carrots. And did I forget to mention that for this time of the year, they were still selling pints of super sweet blueberries for $3.99! My Panda Man was in blueberry heaven all week.

Due to memory card confusion, MPM has some of the photos of us in Napa and of the rest of the dishes I made for the night. I will demand them at my earliest opportunity.

I have all recipes and cooking directions/instructions for anyone who is interested. :)

The first half of the spread,

Back row L to R: simple golden beets w/ fresh sweet basil and some capers, artichoke leaves w/ lemon garlic butter sauce, baked acorn squash w/ maple syrup, and a spinach salad w/ some grapes and homemade candied almonds topped w/ some bosc pear

Front row L to R: sauteed rainbow swiss chard w/ a simple red wine reduction topped with crispy garlic and chives, roasted leg of lamb rubbed with garlic and chives served w/ rainbow carrots and au jus, braised pork shoulder with coconut juice and star anise (I've made this dish before).

This dish was definitely the star of the night. Everyone went back for seconds and thirds and it totally made my night! How beautiful are those star anise?!

The leg of lamb was made with a traditional Greek recipe that I've since adapted to my own. The first few main ingredients are lemon juice, garlic, and butter. Since the carrots were so young and fresh, I only slightly roasted them to give it that nice crunch. 

MPM designed the plate of artichokes and felt so proud of himself all night. 

That is yours truly focusing on plating. 

We also hosted a NYE "pre-game" party, btw - doesn't that just sound so juvenile... we hosted a NYE get together but since we were exhausted from cooking the day before, we kept it simple...

I can't let MPM be in charge of the camera, he is definitely not good about moments. Who take photos after half the food has been eaten?! Crackers, cheese, cured meats, and dips were our basics. Guests brought yummy dips, cocktail shrimps, and poached pear with vanilla. Do make note of the cup of pocky's and fruit roll up. Ingenious!

Melissa made the dish of figs stuffed w/ goat cheese and wrapped in prosciutto that disappeared within seconds of serving. The evidence is seen above as there are only 3 left standing. 

At only 9PM, we  have meekly drank any champagne! Come on now guests...

No worries... more empty bottles did end up complimenting the rest of the stove's surface. 

The crowd mingling. I was so happy about the success of our two parties that I missed countdown at The Pub and fireworks supposedly being done at the Ferry Building.