Hospitality @ Home: Picking a potluck dish

May 29, 2018May 7, 2018 ~ MaryK ~ Leave a comment

It’s the season for cookouts, and if you are anything like me, you cannot go to someone’s house without bringing something to contribute. But what to bring?

Here are a couple of tips for potluck and cookout dishes:

1Bring a dish that you know is delicious. Even if, when you ask the host what you can bring, you end up with a course you don’t immediately have a dish for (salad duty when you are a baker at heart, or vice versa), don’t just wing it. Ask friends for a surefire, vetted recipe (you can hardly go wrong with anything from Cooks Illustrated or Serious Eats), or order something from a local bakery or beloved restaurant that you know is great. It doesn’t matter if a potluck dish is made by your own hands, so long as some level of care went into it’s preparation and it is tasty. Sometimes, the best thing to make is a to-go order. And that’s ok.

2Bring serving utensils for your dish. You can tie your utensils to your casserole dish with a length of twine, but don’t try to serve a tray of macaroni with a flimsy single use picnic fork. It will only end in tears, and potentially in white plastic shrapnel invading your lovely casserole.

3Bring something that can sit at room temperature for a couple of hours. If it is over 75 degrees, avoid anything with mayonnaise or shellfish or both. Alternately, you can sub vegan mayonnaise or pesto on pretty much any sandwich preparation where regular egg-based mayo gives you pause.

4Avoid icings that can melt. Like whipped cream or light butter creams. If possible, avoid icings at all if the event is outside, as they mostly serve to attract bees and wasps. But if you must use a butter cream, be sure to stiffen it with lots of confectioner’s sugar. The greater the sugar to butter ratio, the less likely it is to melt.

5When in doubt, bring beverages. Wine, beer, Sangria, a big old batch of pre-mixed margaritas. Vodka watermelon. Or go teetotal with a nice sweet tea, lemonade, or fruity minty, virgin bramble.

Here are some ideas for great Potluck/ cookout dishes that are more creative than a casserole—

Kale Salad : https://wherethesideworkends.com/2013/05/08/hospitality-home-kale-salad/#more-914

Greek salad: https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/greek-salad-105279

Ribs: http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2016/06/oven-barbecue-bbq-ribs-recipe.html

Pan Bagnat: https://food52.com/recipes/6896-pan-bagnat-le-french-tuna-salad-sandwich

Pressed sandwiches of any kind, like a Mufaletta

Brownies, blondes, cookies, hand pies

Pasta Salad: http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/06/how-to-make-the-best-pasta-salad.html

Sangria: https://wherethesideworkends.com/2010/12/13/hospitality-home-holiday-sangrias/

Margaritas: https://wherethesideworkends.com/2012/05/25/hospitality-home-batch-margaritas/

Fresh fruit lemonade: https://wherethesideworkends.com/2012/06/21/more-than-you-ever-wished-to-know-about-lemonade/

Recipe: Cherry Clafoutis

April 10, 2018April 14, 2018 ~ MaryK ~ Leave a comment

Recipe Video here!

Cherry Clafoutis

3 cups dark, sweet cherries (fresh or frozen), pitted and halved

1 tsp lemon juice

2 tsp flour

Pinch cinnamon

3 eggs

1 1/4 cups milk

1/8 tsp salt

2/3 cup sugar, separated into 1/3 cup portions

1 tbs vanilla extract

1 tsp almond extract

1 tbs butter

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Place cherries on a foil lined baking sheet and roast until soft, about 15 minutes. Transfer to a medium bowl and toss with lemon juice, 2 tsp flour and a healthy pinch of cinnamon. Set aside.

In the pitcher of a blender, or a large flat bowl with an immersion blender, combine milk, eggs, 1/3 cup of sugar, salt, vanilla, and almond extract. Blend on high until combined, about 1 minute. Melt 1 tbs butter in a heavy bottom, oven safe skillet. Pour in a 1/4 inch layer of custard and cook over medium heat until set. Remove from heat.

Add half of the cherries, sprinkle with 1/3 of the remaining 1/3 cup of sugar, then pour on the rest of the custard, finish with the remaining cherries and sugar.

Bake in 425 degree oven until puffed and golden and a knife inserted in the center comes out clean, about 20-30 minutes. Allow to cool in the pan for 20 minutes before serving in wedges.

Hospitality @ Home: Wine Service

February 27, 2018January 9, 2018 ~ MaryK ~ Leave a comment

This is simply a primer on basic wine service for those of you hosting in your home, or others of you who are seeking a restaurant job who have lied on your resumes (not that I have ever known anyone who has done that….)

1. Get a wine key. A real one, you are a grown-up after all. You want a wine key that looks like a swiss army knife, not one that looks like a metal man raising his arms as if to say “It’s gooooooood!” Additionally, your grown-up wine key should, ideally, have a hinged arm, not a solid one. 2. Learn how to use it.

3. Gather your accoutrement. A (polished) wine glass for each wine drinker, a linen napkin to wipe up bottle drips, and your wine key.

4. Pour a taste.

5. Pour 3-4 ounces in each glass. There is no need to overfill the glasses. Wine, like the rest of us, likes to breathe. And it is polite to leave some wine in the bottle, as some guests may enjoy a splash more wine than others.

A couple of other quick notes– one 750mL bottle of wine contains 5 glasses of wine. One bottle of sparkling wine serves 6. You can hardly ever go wrong estimating 2.5 glasses of wine per guest for a dinner party, as some guests will drink more and some less. Though if you know that your set is a thirsty one (that is not driving home), by all means calculate accordingly. Keep in mind that a good host should be well stocked.

Hospitality @ Home: Table Settings

January 30, 2018January 16, 2018 ~ MaryK ~ Leave a comment

It begins with a plate. One plate per person, set directly in front of her chair, about an inch away from the edge of the table.

Next, the entree fork and knife join the party. Fork on the left, knife on the right, with the blade opening toward the plate. The Gent was once a protocol officer in the Air Force, and he told me a story he learned at protocol school about knife blades. According to service mythology, there once lived a King who loved to feast. He loved to drink and tell stories almost as much as he loved feasting, and as a drunken storyteller is wont to do in the middle of a feast, the king flung his hand wildly as he regaled his guests with a tale of recent adventure. His hand brushed the the blade of his knife, which was pointing away from his plate, and the king sliced his hand open.

I have no idea if that story is true, but it is a good way to remember which way to set knives on a dinner table.

Continue reading →

Recipe: (Heart) Beet Wellington

Video ~ January 16, 2018January 15, 2018 ~ MaryK ~ Leave a comment

When I was a kid, my mother treated Valentine’s Day with the same attention as most people give Easter. Valentine’s breakfast would feature heart studded socks tucked in my juice glass and conversation hearts in my cereal bowl. This was, of course, after sitting with me a few days prior to design and create an elaborate valentine’s box in which to stow all of the cards and candy I was sure to receive on the Big Day.

Now that I am a grown up, nothing says Holiday like a beautiful meal with an impressive culinary centerpiece. And nothing says ‘I Love You’ quite so well as ‘I made fresh puff pastry for you, with my very own hands.‘

I wanted to post this in plenty of time for Valentine’s Day, in case you ant to give it a test drive.

Buckle up, kids this one is an epic!

Recipes after the jump…. Continue reading →

Restaurant 101: Prep Tip

February 20, 2014December 15, 2014 ~ MaryK ~ 1 Comment

The main difference between restaurant cooking and home cooking is preparation. Restaurant cooks plan their dishes days and weeks and in advance which gives them time to spread tasks over a few days in order to build up flavors and get the most out of each ingredient.

A few years ago, a pastry chef gave me a great tip that completely changed the way I make desserts: to get the most flavor, steep cream ingredients in advance. Making a vanilla custard, panna cotta, cream brulee? Let the vanilla steep in the cream for 24-48 hours. This works great for other reedy, seedy things (like fennel, anise, stick cinnamon, lemongrass) and subtle flavors (chamomile, lemon verbena). Shorter steeping times (30 min-2 hours) are best for more pungent flavors (rosemary, mint, lavender, citrus zests). From there, your combinations are endless. For a dinner party, how elegant (and easy) would a chamomile panna cotta with lemon curd be? Or a vanilla bean panna cotta with blueberry sauce? For an asian twist, how about a lemongrass creme brulee with ginger sugar?

Simply bring your cream, half & half, or milk to a simmer and add your flavoring agent. Remove from heat and allow to come to room temperature then chill in the refrigerator until ready to use. Strain the cream before using in your recipe.

Hospitality @ Home: Kale Salad

May 8, 2013December 15, 2014 ~ MaryK ~ 4 Comments

kale salad ingredients — the beginnings of a beautiful salad

Let us take a moment to consider Kale. That humble, sweet green with the bitter bite that has the texture of an innertube when not prepared correctly. You can’t swing a salad spinner around Los Angeles these days without hitting a restaurant with a Kale Salad on the menu. I am ever hopeful, but alas, have been burned many times by the sub-par kale salad.

Until I encountered the amazing version at Food Lab in Silverlake. I had read about it on Yelp!, Twitter, Facebook, everywhere, and when I met a friend there for lunch a couple weeks ago, I knew I had to have it. Studded with almonds, shallots, brussels sprouts and romano cheese, this salad is my new obsession.