{cali-persian dinner party menu}

{dress from here}

Remember a few weeks back when I said I really wanted to recreate the entire "Cali-Persian" menu in Bon Appetit?  Well this past Sunday night we had some friends over for a little dinner party and we did just that!  The dishes in the article are not only super colorful and photogenic, but also bursting with flavor.  The best part of these recipes is while some of the preparation uses some foreign cooking methods (especially the rice), there are no hard to find or odd ingredients that will have you running all over town.

We opted to switch out the main lamb entree for a pork loin in the favor of mass appeal for our guests and you can see the recipe for the pork at the bottom of this post.  Overall this menu came out perfect for a warm summer evening- the food was refreshing yet satisfying and filled with interesting herbal flavor combinations.

Our menu for the evening was as follows:

Appetizers:

• simple cheese plate and snacks
• lavender & lemon champagne cocktail (recipe coming on Friday!)

Dinner:

• shirazi salad
• shallot yogurt
• jeweled rice
• old grain toasted bread & herbed butter
• herb marinated pork loin- recipe at bottom of post

Dessert:

• rose water cookies served with vanilla ice cream**

**our dinner guests insisted on bringing dessert, but had they not offered this was the dessert I would have made to accompany the meal. 

Herb Marinated Pork Tenderloin

what you need:

• 1 pork tenderloin
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 3 tablespoons of salt
• 2 teaspoon of chopped rosemary 
• 1 tablespoon of olive oil
• 1/4 cup chopped parsley

1. For Brine: Combine orange juice, salt, chopped rosemary and 1/2 cup of water in bowl and stir to dissolve salt.  
2. Place the tenderloin in a ziplock bag and add brine.  Brine for 6-12 hours
3. Remove pork from brine and pat dry.  Brush with olive oil.
4. Sear pork loin on high heat in a grill pan or cast iron skillet until nicely browned.
5. Finish in a 400 degree oven until internal temperature reaches 140 degrees. (approximately 10-15 minutes)
6. Rest for 10 minutes and then slice on the bias into 12 pieces.  Top with chopped parsley.  

{dressed up caprese}

Pretty soon I am going to change the name of this blog to "100 ways to make caprese" - not today, but if I keep posting stuff like this then that name change might be right around the corner.  Anyways- you know what is good is mini skewered caprese bites, but what is even better is when you make them a bit bigger,  double the layers, add in sliced red beets and top the whole thing with a sprinkling of pistachios.  This is exactly the type of appetizer you bring to someone's house that will make them think you actually know what you are doing in the kitchen.  Plus it looks effortless to make and the bonus is that it actually takes little to no effort!

{appetizers for dinner}

I like appetizers. A lot.  I'm generally reminding myself at social get togethers to not embarrass myself by taking the entire plate of appetizers off of a server's tray as they are passing through.  Maybe it's because I love tiny food so much and the general idea of an appetizer is to be cute and bite size.  This past weekend, Chris and I were trying to brainstorm up a menu for a little night spend in and after only finding appetizer ideas that sounded appealing we decided to make a dinner out of a dishes you would usually find on the "starters" menu.  Rather than sit down for a proper meal, we spent the evening cooking in the kitchen together and enjoying the appetizers as they became ready.   We cooked up three different dishes (click on the different elements below for recipe links):

• grilled asparagus topped with a perfect fried egg and romesco sauce
• pan fried cauliflower with romesco and topped with flat leaf parsley & garlic toasted panko flakes
• mortadella spread with fresh baby spinach & balsamic glazed cashews (recipe at bottom of post)

 {charred red peppers for the romesco sauce}

{a maple old fashioned to accompany the cooking}

 {pan fried cauliflower on a bed of romesco topped with flat leaf parsley & garlic toasted panko}

{grilled asparagus with friend egg and romesco sauce}

                              {crostini with mortadella spread topped with spinach & balsamic cashews}

what you need

• 1/2 lb mortadella
• 1 cup chopped baby spinach
• 1/3 cup chopped cashews
• 1/3 cup balsamic vinaigrette
• 1/2 sliced french baguette
• 1/3 cup olive oil

1. Chop cashews and lightly toast. Toss with balsamic vinaigrette and set aside. 
2. Cut mortadella into small chunks and place in food processor with about 1/4 to 1/3 cup of olive oil until mixture reaches a spreadable consistency.
3. Toast baguette slices.
4. Spread about 3 tablespoons of the mortadella onto each toasted slice.
5. Top with chopped spinach and large spoonful of the balsamic cashew mixture.
6. Lightly salt to taste.

{a birthday cocktail party}

{see the DIY instructions for the backdrop HERE}

Last night we hosted a little cocktail party get together to celebrate our birthdays.  This was the first large gathering we have had at our new place in Chicago and I decided to keep it simple rather than going all out with a theme.  Inspired by the fun mix of colors from this photo, I created some simple decorations using a mix of tissue paper I already had laying around.  A few strands of garland and some confetti was all this party needed to turn it from a regular get-together into a birthday celebration, along with a spread  of savory and sweet snacks.  And to top it all off (because its not a cocktail party without alcohol) we made big batch of whiskey punch and diy champagne cocktail set up!

 {our dining room set up moved around slightly, instructions for garland here}

 {a party staple- our party sized recipe version here. every time we make this punch I bet Chris that there is no way our guests will finish it and I am consistently proven wrong as this was drained clean by the end of the night even though it had 3 full handles of whiskey in it!}

{champagne cocktail set up}

 {my favorite champagne bottle bucket from here}

{recipe for this party favorite is right here} 

{I did not make these from scratch (no one has that kind of time)-

 they are available in the freezer aisle of target}

 {easiest recipe to make. ever. its only three ingredients and your friends will be so impressed- recipe here}

{funfetti-obviously. this is a birthday party after all.}

{mini red velvet}

{mango, black bean & coconut tacos}

Since moving to Chicago we have had lots of things to distract us from getting too homesick; we have gotten to spend some time off work decorating our place, went on an insane vacation with 20 new friends in the Dominican Republic and have met countless other amazing people who have all moved here for Kellogg.  Regardless of all the fun distractions, I have definitely missed our regular visits to Malo and Mas Malo for their amazing tacos (especially dollar taco night). When I came across this recipe for mango and black bean tacos, I knew it would be just the thing to give us a little reminder of LA.  Even though Malo sticks to the more traditional taco recipes, the sound of the coconut cream sauce on these tacos was too much to ignore.  

The prep time on these tacos was incredibly fast and the end result was a spicy and sweet taco filled with complex flavors from the mixture of jalapenos, mango and coconut.  These would be even better with a carne asada or some soy-rizo.  The coconut sauce alone is something I would love to experiment with drizzled onto other dishes and as a side note the recipe I referenced for this dish yields A TON of the coconut sauce so unless you do intend to use it for other dishes I would recommend cutting it by at least half.

   

{peach & ricotta crostini}

Crostini is definitely our go to appetizer for dinner parties: it's quick, can be served cold and has limitless options for toppings.  See a few of the past crostini recipes we have made here and here.  For this past Saturday's dinner party,  I wanted to do something that was a mixture of salty and sweet. Since we had some leftover rosemary we decided on ricotta sprinkled with finely chopped rosemary then topped with a piece of prosciutto and a slice of sweet white peach.  The best thing about this particular crostini combination (other than that it obviously tastes great) is it holds up really well and can be made a few hours in advance!

{plaid party: the sweets}

The sweets for our plaid party were similar to the savory snacks since they were a mix of home-made and store bought items.   I have actually never done a dessert spread with so many different choices before and I realized after the fact that most of the choices had some sort of chocolate in them- not that anyone was complaining, but I think next time it would be better to have more of a mix.  Here is what we served for the sweets at our holiday party:

• assortment of cookies from Trader Joes: Salted Caramel Milk Chocolate, Dark Chocolate Sprinkle Rounds & Cranberry Pistachio Cookie Wreaths. 

• mint chocolate pirouette sticks

• home-made chocolate dipped marshmallows, instructions here

• chocolate dipped pretzels, you can see my very first blog post about these here.

• snickerdoodle cupcakes, recipe here

• chocolate bark with bacon, cayenne pepper and toasted slivered almonds- another amazing find like the bratwurst bites that will surely become a party staple. Instructions for this are below.

Originally, I had planned on doing a sweet themed chocolate bark, but we ended up having a little bit of bacon left over from the bacon wrapped dates so we decided to take the bark in a more savory direction.  First we cooked up a few strips of bacon, let them cool and cut them into tiny pieces.  I melted full pound of milk chocolate from Trader Joes and spread it about 1/4 inch thick onto a piece of parchment paper on top of a sheet pan.  Immediately, we topped it with the bacon pieces, some toasted slivered almonds and a healthy sprinkle of cayenne pepper.  After sitting in the fridge overnight, you can break the bark up into pieces.  This would make an awesome Christmas gift paired with a nice bottle whiskey.

 Up next tomorrow- the last plaid party post: the drinks!