Dinner Planning for the Beach

We will be heading down the Nags Head again this year.  Already, I am trying to plan my menu to feed 25 or so guests.  With such a goal in mind, it gives me a chance to do the ever-pleasurable review of my cookbooks, or scout out my Bon Appetit magazines monthly to find something that will surprise and delight the house.

The house is large; the kitchen magnificent (a great kitchen x 2) with the exception that not everything works as it should.  And, there is a paucity of decent pans etc, to the point that I haul down equipment (food processor, blender, knives, pots/pans) to have the necessary tools to accomplish the task at hand.  The task is that the house is divided into teams.  There are generally 4 teams with a team captain of which I am one.  The purpose is simply to provide happy hour, dinner and dessert to the balance of the house. And cleaning up! There's a competition and all with the prize being a plastic severed body part.  High stakes indeed!

I'll not lie to you:  it is hard planning, purchasing, logisticizing (I know that is not a word) for that many people.  That being said, it is wonderful to be fed by others on the other 4 nights, and fun to get the feedback on one's own offering.

I've got a long while to settle on my offering.  I have to remind myself that

Perfection is the enemy of the good

That means for me for this task, that quite a bit of time and effort can go into the perfect menu, when most people will be happy with good.  That being said, I will rationalize that finding the perfect menu is an exercise in broadening my culinary inquiry.  As part of my long list of non-resolutions for the New Year, culinary inquiry is at the top of my non-list.

I sit down with a cookbook like normal folks who read regular books (and I read those too).  "The Dinner" gives purpose to my my perusing. Plus, putting the pieces of a dinner together is fun for me.
A thoughtful friend gave me Jacques Pepin's Complete Techniques as Christmas gift. I did read it cover to halfway through.  Lots of great information, to include how to skin a rabbit.

To be a true cook is to understand these things.  I'm happy faking it, and starting further up the process!  In the meantime, I'll conduct my chore of planning my menu from the comfortable chair of the elephant room with a glass of wine and the warmth of the fire.

I currently have a few books around me, one of which is The Gourmet Cooking School Cookbook by Dione Lucas with Darlene Geis.  (A thrift/antique store find).  In her section on equipment to have in the kitchen, one essential piece is a pepper mill. . .

One for whole white, one for whole black peppercorns. Don't ever use commercially ground pepper; you might just as well throw sand in your food. (p. 17)

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Cookbooks

I was weary from my cabinet work on Sunday.  Nevertheless, I stopped by the CHKD Thrift Store to scan the aisles for cool stuff.  I have bought several things there:  books, jeans, blazers and skirts and a dining set (cherry, queen anne for my property staging).

I love to cook...a passion that I somehow idled most of 2012.  And, I love to READ cookbooks.  I've picked up several cookbooks in odd nooks along the way:  antique stores, consignment shops, thrift stores.  My "Great Cooks Cookbook" is one of many that I've bought, read cover to cover, and found recipes to keep in my cooking repertoire.

So meandering through the CHKD store I picked up 4 cookbooks that I'm just thrilled about--one of which was "The Best of Gourmet--65 years and 65 Favorite Recipes".  I subscribed years ago for exactly one year to Gourmet.  In general, I found the recipes fussy, so I abandoned my subscription.  I went with Bon Appetit, the sister magazine, and I've been a subscriber for 25 or so years.  As part of my decluttering, I threw out old issues that I had been harboring like fugitives in every nook and cranny of bookcases and closets.  It was like throwing out children---difficult and emotional.  Now that they are gone, I don't give them a second thought.

Recipes are abundant, to be sure.  Excellent recipes are not.  The joy of reading a cookbook is recognizing immediately that a recipe is going to work for your style of eating/entertaining.  The hallmark of a good cook book, to me at least, is that I walk away inspired and eager to make a recipe.  Visiting a cookbook is much like going to a restaurant, there are only going to be one or two dishes that truly captivate you (well, at least it is that way for me!).  Rare is the time that I go to a restaurant and find more than two things that I'm just dying to try.  But it happens.

I know that when I threw out my BA issues, that there were recipes forever lost.  No, they don't all make it to the website.  The maple pecan chocolate tart is not there.  It is one of the most divine desserts that I've ever made--and it is a staple at Thanksgiving.  There is another great recipe:  Harricorts with goat cheese and cranberries....lost it and can find no trace of it anywhere.  Best to read the magazine, rip out the recipes and put them in plastic sheet covers and commit them to a 3 ring binder.  Of course you have to MAKE the recipe...and that ought to be a resolution for any home chef to try new things:  new techniques, combinations, ingredients, cooking methods.  That way when you leave this plane of existence, your progeny will have in hand the wonderful recipes that left a gastronomical imprint on them.  Those are always the most lasting memories.

And throw out the recipes that just don't work for you....along with any other detritus in your life.

My sister is coming this weekend from Bedford.  She  recently received a well deserved promotion. I want to have a special dinner for her.  Though I'm not shy to try new things, she loves crabcakes, and I have JUST dish for her:  Crabcakes with spicy Avocado sauce (you can find it on Epicurious.com) .  It is basically a baked crabcake because there is no filler.  You shape it, press panko crumbs that have been browned in garlic and butter and press the into the crabcake.  The avocado sauce is as spicy as you care to make it with serrano/jalapeno chiles.  It is silky with a hidden bite. I think some roasted asparagus will go well with it.

I'll save the 4 cheese macaroni in the Gourmet cookbook for another time....but there are at least 6 recipes from that cookbook that I'm eager to tackle.  I also picked up Food and Wine cookbook (Best of the Best from 25 cookbooks),  and  Lidia's Italian American Kitchen.  I bought two other, non cooking books during my CHKD visit.  The total:  $13.64...I rounded up to $15.  ON another jaunt I picked up hardback Joy of Cooking--two.

Yes, that is the way to shop for cookbooks.

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