It’s your birthday! What would you like for supper? Someone else will lovingly do the shopping, and pay for all the ingredients, including a nice bottle of wine or two or three. They’ll do the cooking, and wash the dishes afterwards, leaving the kitchen spotless. (Why do so few people understand that washing the dishes automatically includes wiping down the counters? Hm. A question for another day.)
Shall I go first? Do please join me for a lovely meal. I’ll get out the good china.
So. How many courses… let’s say six. We’ll want a nice hors d’ouevre. And soup, thick or thin. Then the main course. Then let’s do it the old-fashioned way and have our salad now, as a palate-cleanser. Then a dessert. Then a cheese plate.
We’ll have service à la russe, with the courses brought to the tables one after the other. Service à la française, with everything brought to the table at once, is impractical, however grand a display it makes.
As the hors d’oeuvre, we’ll have Oysters Gloria, which is an individual oyster and custard casserole made the way my foodie friend Gloria makes it. Can’t tell you what’s in it, beyond eggs, cream and just a little garlic, but it. is. fine.
A thin soup, I think. In fact, a jellied sherry consomme. I actually made one once, and it was heaven.
Main course. I haven’t had a steak in a while, so, a filet mignon, medium rare, not bacon wrapped, since that would be gilding the lily. Fresh steamed asparagus. And a proper Venetian risi e bisi, made with a good intense chicken stock made from scratch.
Here’s the salad: mushrooms with yuzu dressing. Yuzu fruits are sort of a cross between an orange and a grapefruit. http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Mushroom-Salad-with-Yuzu-Dressing-365165
The dessert. Oh, my, so difficult to decide… but let’s have apple and cranberry pie. We’ll use this recipe http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Cranberry-Ribbon-Apple-Pie-108854, but will the apples will be Macintosh, King of All Apples. Vanilla ice cream alongside.
Cheese. Easy. A good four-year old white cheddar from Quebec. Some cambozola, aka blue brie. And a nice Emmentaler. There’ll be no wretched nasty dry crackers exploding in crumbs all over this table, instead we’ll have thin, slightly chewy toast from a good granary loaf.
Wines? I dunno from wines, so just don’t bring me any of that disgusting chardonnay.
But I’d like a glass of armagnac with the cheese course, please.
Oh, that was delicious. Many thanks to the cook, and to my companions, for the good conversation, always the best part of any meal.
I’m off for a nap, now.
