Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Fantastic Food

With this kind of title, I feel like I should be writing a children's book. Who knows, maybe I will! But actually, this is about some fantastic dinner parties I went to recently.

I met my friend Alvin at swing. He's super fun and quite hospitable, and he's thrown a succession of dinner parties in the past few weeks. The food was so amazing, that I thought I should share its greatness with you!

The first party was a turducken party! For those of you who don't know, a turducken is a turkey stuffed with a duck stuffed with a chicken. To make it even more epic, there's also a different stuffing for each bird, and a lot of bacon to fill in the holes. Or just because bacon makes it better.

All the ingredients before assemblage.

It was an amazing feat of cookery, and all us guests were excited by the results. To top it all off, we even had the party on a rooftop! I've always wanted to go to a rooftop party, since I always hear my neighbors having parties, and they sound fun. Finally, my dream was realized! I had to waddle home, but I was happy.

Can I get an "ooh"?

See all the layers?

Our view from the rooftop.

The happy people.

This last weekend, Alvin decided to attempt a fish! I showed up a little early to see if I could help, and things were crazy! Apparently the outlets stopped working so that the convection oven would no longer work. Also, the crock-pot that was supposed to be cooking the ratatouille up and died. Wonderful. Iman, the guy whose house the party was at, called in some guys to fix the power problem so we were up and running again.

Cooking with Alvin!

The fish amazed me! Alvin stuffed it with herbs and garlic and then buried it in salt! I really mean buried, since he used TWO POUNDS! That's a cooking method I'd never heard of, but after tasting it I decided I was a fan. After cooking, he unearthed the fish and carefully peeled back the skin, revealing perfectly cooked fish that wasn't salty at all!

The fish, drowning in salt.

Excavating the the fish.

Oh, I should also tell you that it was a chocolate-themed dinner party. Alvin whipped up a sauce of white chocolate with shallots, herbs, cream, olive oil, and other things to go with the fish. I was skeptical, but it was really good! There was also chocolate/balsamic dressing for the salad, a chocolate apple pie, and chocolate chip oatmeal cookies! There was also the ratatouille and mashed potatoes with bacon, but I'm thankful that those dishes didn't include chocolate.

A plate of mashed potatoes, salad, and fish with chocolate sauce. You can see the pies in the background.

I was once again happy and satisfied at the end of the night. Not only was the food delectable, but the people were really fun as well. A successful evening. Although now I am much more dissatisfied with my own culinary exploits.

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