Beyond School...

For my mom's 50th birthday, my sisters and I surprised her with a dinner party at our home with the "immediate" family...which is 22 food-obsessed Italians. To understand why we did this, you should know a little about my mom: 1. she would love to spend every day in her beautiful and cozy house, 2. she would love to spend every one of those days with her family in her beautiful and cozy house, and 3. she thinks anything her daughters do (or cook!) is the most wonderful thing that's ever been. So, the 50th birthday dinner idea was born. Genius right? Wrong. We only had a few hours to get her out of the house and prep the entire meal (see reason #1), and it got prettttty stressful. In fact, I think I was still covered in flour 15 minutes before the surprise. But it all came together at the end and it was truly a wonderful and delicious night. 


The menu was an 8 course tasting of all of my mom's favorite foods prepared with an elegant twist. We also created a beautiful table setting and peppered the room with old photos of the birthday girl. The food-obsessed Italian family approved.

table of pink and gold (her favorite colors)

rolling pasta = death

still cooking -- 6:45 pm (nice cut-off softball tee, S)

Still cooking, 6:55 pm

the surprise! 7 pm

tasting menu

first course: pork, beef and veal meatballs in "Sunday gravy"
with homemade ricotta

second course: spedini from Angelo's of Mulberry
(fried mozzarella sandwiches in a light anchovy tomato sauce)

third course: roasted cauliflower pizza with bechamel and fresh mozzarella 

fourth course: spicy papardelle pomodoro

fifth course: linguine vongole 

sixth course: homemade butternut squash ravioli in a brown butter sage sauce

seventh course: skirt steak with Chateaux Briand mushroom reduction

eight course: dessert trio (toffee brownies, Carousel Cakes red velvet,
& puff pastry napoleon)

Sugar!

Because the school aims to prepare us to work all stations in the kitchen, we had two full weeks on pastry. Amazingness. I really hate when people say they don't have a "sweet tooth." Give me a break. It's kind of like when people claim they like dark chocolate over milk chocolate and would rather sleep on a firm mattress. It's just not true and we all know it. Dessert is the best thing ever, everyone loves it, and that's the end of it. Enjoy the eye candy!

 soufflés before

check out the height on that one girlfriend

what's better than a chocolate soufflé?

a cheese soufflé

thebomb.com

fruit soufflé
(cheese>chocolate>fruit, obviously, so the soufflés followed suit)

but these were the cutest fluff balls I've seen in a while

whipping egg whites

making fluff aka meringues 

chocolate and vanilla meringues filled with créme chantilly

profiterole swan

homemade ice cream

glacé au fruits
also adorable

caramel
I got carried away.

banana fritters with cinnamon caramel sauce

bande de tarte aux fruits with puff pastry

tarte aux pommes
[apple tart]

quiche lorraine
[quiche with bacon and gruyère]

tarte aux poires à la frangipane
[pear tarte with almond cream]

génoise
[spongecake with mocha buttercream and almonds]

the French take their crêpes very seriously

crêpes suzette
[crêpes in a orange glaze and candied orange zest]

crêpes au jambon et champignons
[crêpes with ham, mushroom and cheese filling]

<3 lisa, the little foodie