Dinner for Sixteen

Last Friday we held a going away dinner for a friend and colleague of ours who will soon take up a new post as assistant professor of biochemistry at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. On a rainy night starting at about 7 pm, we packed sixteen people into our 400 sq ft apartment for a three-course dinner and a copious outpouring of wine and good wishes. Five hours and sixteen bottles of wine later, the last guests left well-fed and in good cheer.

Of course Melissa's careful planning and brilliant execution made the night a great success, and our only misdeed may have been sending off the guest of honor a little later (and possibly a little rougher around the edges) than he meant to be leaving town on the following day...

Here is Melissa's account:

Always up for a challenge I agreed to Matt's idea of hosting a farewell dinner for one of our friends who moved to Atlanta this weekend. That challenge was that Matt was inviting the entire floor in the building where he works - and their partners. In the end we had a guest list of 14 plus ourselves but it could have ended up much bigger.

So how do you cook a three course dinner for 16 people out of a 400 square foot apartment while a storm rages outside, blocking access to the only dining table? It's all in the planning:

Menu

Nibbles on arrival

Pita chips with curried hummus and tabouleh
Olives, artichoke hearts and pickled onions

First Course: Eggplant stuffed with spiced lamb on roasted capsicum with pomegranate dressing

Second Course: Angel hair pasta with a chicken and mushroom cream sauce

Dessert: Mixed berry and apple crumble.

Recipes

Both the Hummus and Tabouleh recipes have already been posted on Foodie Calls.

I made the hummus the night before and refrigerated it in the ramekins I planned to serve it in. The bulgar wheat was also cooked the night before, but the rest of the tabouleh ingredients were assembled a couple of hours before everyone arrived.

Pita Chips

Buy whole pita breads and split in half by gently running a knife between the two layers. Brush rough side with olive oil and crushed garlic. Bake in a 420oF oven for ~5 to 10 minutes until lightly browned. Let cool a little and then cut into wedges. This needs to be started around 15 minutes before people are due to arrive so the chips are a little warm and there is a wonderful toasted garlic aroma in the air to tickle their tastebuds.

Eggplant and lamb

This is a recipe from Cuisine Magazine that I'd made before. I exchanged the chickpeas for minced/ground lamb and added a few fennel seeds. If you can't get pomegranate molasses for the dressing just buy pure pomegranate juice and simmer it in a pan to reduce it to a syrup. It retains all of its tart flavours. I made 2.5x the recipe.

I made the lamb filling, pomegranate dressing and roasted the bell pepper/capsicum the night before. The eggplant slices need to be cooked on the day, but as I needed 16 slices grilled on each side, and I could only fit around 6 in the oven at a time I started cooking them on one side a couple of hours before everyone arrived. I cooked the eggplant on sheets of aluminium foil and once a batch was done flipped the eggplant to the uncooked side and lifted the foil with the eggplant on it and stacked it right on top of the last lot. This held in a lot of the heat and continued cooking so that around 1/2 hour after everyone had arrived and was comfortable all I had to do was transfer each foil layer back to the grill for around 5 minutes to brown the other side of the eggplant.

The roasted peppers and filling I reheated by nuking in the microwave (covered to keep all the moisture in). It took around 5 minutes to assemble each plate with a roast pepper half on bottom, eggplant wrapped around filling on top, finished with a dollop of Greek yogurt and a drizzle of pomegranate reduction. Amanda did the honours of passing out the plates, and by the time she'd finished with the first six, another six were on their way.

Pasta

3 lbs Mixed mushrooms - I used baby bello, portobello and oyster mushrooms
1 lb Skinless and boneless chicken thigh
1/2 lb Butter
1 cup light cream
1 tbsp Chicken stock paste
1 tbsp Dried tarragon
3 tbsp Dijon mustard
2 Sliced red onions
1 lb Arugula/Rocket leaves
32 oz Angel hair pasta

2 tbsp Cornstarch/cornflour to thicken

The night before, I sliced the mushrooms and the red onions and defrosted the chicken so they were ready to go. To cook I first filled a stock pot with warm water and put on the heat to boil the water. This is by far the most time consuming part of the recipe, as it can take up to 30 minutes for a large pot of water to reach a rolling boil. Then I crammed as many mushrooms as I could into a covered pot with a couple of sticks of butter (200 g) roughly chopped, and cooked over a low to medium heat. Every 5 minutes I'd check the mushrooms and try to get the uncooked ones to the top, and vice versa.

The mushrooms release a lot of moisture, and after ~15 minutes of cooking I added 1 tbsp of chicken stock paste and the tarragon to the mushrooms. While the mushrooms were cooking, I sliced the chicken into small thin pieces and got the onions cooking. In a large pan I fried the onions in a little olive oil till they were translucent, and then removed them from the pan. Next I added the chicken a fried till it was cooked through, then added back the onions and added the Dijon mustard. At this point if I had a pot or pan big enough, I would have mixed everything together and added the cream. Instead, I transferred some of the mushrooms to the pan with the chicken and onions and added cream to both the mushrooms in the pot and chicken in the pan, and simmered for a couple of minutes.

With the sauce almost done it was time to cook the pasta. This pasta is so thin it takes around 3-4 minutes to cook al dente. In fact, I was more worried about overcooking it to mush than it not being ready in time, so I left it to the very last minute to cook. Back to the chicken and mushrooms, I thickened the sauce with a paste of cornflour and a little cream. Add a little at a time, since it takes around 30 seconds for the sauce to thicken after addition to a simmering sauce. Stop adding cornflour when you have the consistency you desire. I then combined both the pot of mushrooms and the pan of sauce which just fit in the pan. Drain the pasta as soon as its al dente.

To serve I placed a small handful of arugula at the bottom of each dish, topped with a tong full of pasta and spooned the mushroom, chicken mixture on top.

Berry, apple crumble

Fruit filling
8 granny smith apples
1 lb of frozen mixed berries
1/2 cup of sugar
1 tbsp of ground cinnamon
Topping
2 cups of rolled oats
1 cup of dark brown sugar
1/2 lb of butter
2 tbsp of ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp of ground allspice
1/2 tsp of ground nutmeg
To serve
Greek yogurt
Mint sprigs

The previous night I peeled and diced the apples into large chunks and placed in a ziplock bag with a little lemon juice to stop the pieces going brown. Before everyone arrived I scattered the mixed berries, apple, sugar and cinnamon into two casserole dishes with lids and set aside. I also put all the topping ingredients into the kitchen aid mixer so the butter could soften and it was ready to mix just before I needed it. Just before I started preparing the chicken, I put the covered dishes with fruit in the oven at 380oF to let the fruit stew in its own juices. Around 10 minutes before everyone was ready for dessert I started the mixer to combine the butter and oats etc and removed the fruit from the oven. I topped the stewed fruit with a layer of topping and put back in to the oven uncovered to get the topping nicely toasted (~10 minutes). To serve I topped each portion with a dollop of Greek yogurt and a small mint sprig.