It’s the Holidays, and you might well be scurrying about: Friends are coming to Dinner!
Or is Social Updating limited to Twitter and Facebook. Do you invite people over? Do you get nervous and then mad? Wish you’d never invited them? Throughout my years of teaching I have listened to many stories from friends and my students. Fear. Loathing. More Fear.
You’d think entertaining was like Las Vegas with Johnny Depp. And in the immortal words of Raoul Duke-
“There was madness in any direction, any hour. You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning.”
Okay, this is before you get started, right? The evening beckons and promises to be beautiful from afar, elegant, mysterious, and powerful. But just turn your back for one minute.….
So, I’ve come up with a set of rules that I follow.
I recently too extended an invitation and immediately my mind luxuriated in the ambiance of the whole scene. No, I don’t do psychedelic drugs like Raoul, but there was a flurry of sparks and a universal glow in the sky! I closed my eyes to the aroma of sauces reducing. Even the pile of dirty pots and pans, could not dissuade me. I love them all! (Truly, I do love washing dishes.) And I pictured in a moment of triumph the last moment, as I hang up my apron by the refrigerator and sat with my friends at the table, tucking my leg under me. Candles flickering, wine is sipped. Spoons lift soup from bowls.
“Let’s keep it simple this time,” I said to my husband, Rich, as I sat down to make a list.
Eleven Rules of Cooking For Guests
Rule #1 – Be organized
He rolled his eyes at me, if you can imagine.
Glancing at the clock showed there was still six hours till our friends arrive. PLENTY of time. Oodles in fact.
“I know what you’re thinking. Have you no faith that I can change?”
He unpacked the bags from the farmer’s market.
Rule #2 – Shop in advance
“Ok, just what is up with your eyes?” I ask.
A deluge of rain began outside. And my eyes were already closing, so melodic is the pitter patter of drops.
So I plan my strategy over an early lunch at my computer; a bowl of warmed leftover chicken piccata and lentils, I assembled my list to assess just how expertly matched were my ambitions and my time.
Hmm.
Rule # 3 – Know your Limits
Appetizers – Unknown (something will surely show itself)
Roasted Broccoli Salad
Another Veg
Home-Baked Focaccia
Caponata
Fish – Whatever Rich “Catches”
Flourless Chocolate Cake – Already Baked, Yay!
What could be simpler, I asked? As I stepped up from the office, piercing and tumbling two eggplant on another pan and opening the oven to the scent of roasting garlic and a nicely crisp broccoli, I pondered. The sublime image of going to the garden with our guests to pick some herbs and lettuces. Ouch. Now my hand was burnt. With ice on my hand, dripping on my list. Whatever came after “Another Veg” gets blurry. Okay, now I remember. Done. I cross off Focaccia. My guests voices boomed in my head: Let there be No Carbs. Okay! Okay!
Rule #4 – Ask if Your Guests have Special Diets
Rain poured – it shooted in fact, out of the downspout. Rich had not yet cleaned the leaves out of the gutters.
But before I could snap into a nap I set down to wait for the two eggplants. After they cool, a simple chopping with capers and they’ll climb in with the burbling sauce of tomatoes, garlic, celery, onions, and peppers on the stove. I’ll stir in some broken shards of 85 % chocolate. This version of Sicilian Caponata is a favorite and hails form Papa Andrea’s Sicilian Table. Spicy, sweet, and salty from capers and aromatic from our fresh bay leaves.
Turning the heat to low, the computer dings in the office, and demands that I answer a few – just a few- more emails. Good thing as there was an email from the folks coming.
She begins, “Did I mention he’s allergic to garlic and onions? But he can “eat around” anything you make. He’ll be fine,” she concludes.
What? I say to myself? Everything has garlic and onions.
Rule # 5 Be Flexible and Roll With It
Oh, well. I won’t put any more garlic and onions in anything — its fine.
And surely while I am in this chair its efficient to update Twitter and Facebook, too. Then I can really relax and enjoy the afternoon and evening!
With Social Updating complete, I push away from the desk. But it nags at me, a little, isn’t that what dinners are? Social Updating? Or were, I say, before we all got so social that we never see each other anymore.
Come back for the conclusion of this story, and feel free to leave a comment.
Do you do Social Updating by have friends over for dinner? And how do you manage it? What happens in your kitchen?
