Stacks of empty plates equal success
Dinner party for 8 executed by experts shows what can be done on limited budget
Sitting down for dinner is my job.
That’s why I volunteered to host a working dinner party for eight in my home.
The goal, as we’ve been showing you these past few weeks, was to entertain in style for less than $250. We called in specialists to cook, choose wine, decorate the table and advise on invitations.
Considering my boss was coming over, the stress was minimal. Usually, the host covers everything but since this was a group effort, I was excused from certain duties.
I didn’t have to cook, for one. That burden fell to my able colleague Karon Liu, the Star’s food writer. Wine critic and sommelier Carolyn Evans Hammond selected the wine list. Stylist Debra Norton set the table and etiquette expert Karen Cleveland kept us all apprised of the do’s and don’ts.
The lot of us served as guests, along with our editor, Mary Vallis, and two of my friends.
All I had to do was tidy the main floor, keep my three children from getting underfoot and shuttle the food from the Star’s test kitchen at 1 Yonge St., where Karon prepared most of the food, to my Etobicoke home.
I even hired help to wash the dishes and babysit my youngest, age 8, who greeted guests in a scary clown mask. Still, it was work. Hosting always is. “You can’t be a guest at your own party,” former butler Charles MacPherson said in an interview.
I was both excited and nervous (I mentioned my boss coming over, right?).
It was hard to fill the two empty spots at the table. Notice was short. I asked amongst those acquaintances who are comfortable with strangers, knowing they’d draw the Star writers away from shop talk and into lively conversation.
In addition to a five-course gourmet meal with matching wines, I promised prospective guests they could arrive at 5:30 p.m., eat in their sweatpants and leave by 8 p.m.
Despite such inducements, quite a few turn me down. But Alex Cahuas, who runs my fitness boot camp, accepted. Working mother Alison Leung stepped in after a last-minute cancellation.
Here’s a rundown of how the evening went. All in all, we made it through without arguments, broken dishes or people falling off their chairs. True, my indoor cat tried multiple escapes through the front door as guests were departing. But he seemed the only one in a hurry to leave. 3:10 p.m. Drats. Because of an accident on the Gardiner Expressway, Karon and I pull into my driveway 10 minutes past the agreed time to start setting up.
My husband has let in stylist Debra Norton and photographer Marcus Oleniuk, who is there to capture the event start to finish. They are silently at work in the dining room. Marcus clamps a camera to a staircase banister for a bird’s-eye view. It quietly clicks a time-lapse series of photographs of the table being set.
(To avoid being photographed and thus preserve my critic’s anonymity, I manage to stand behind Marcus most of the night. Sorry, mom, no pictures of me, but the house looks good!) 3:30 p.m. Debra lays the tablecloth (mine) and plucks greenery from a tall vase (hers). The low arrangement of evergreens she has planned will foster cross-table conversation.
In the kitchen, Karon minces garlic and rosemary to rub on the pork, then mixes the batter for the blini appetizers. While the pork rests, he finally has time to eat (half ) his takeout lunch of chicken on rice. 3:45 p.m. Carolyn drops off wine and a corkscrew, with clear instructions on which three bottles to chill. She promises to return later for the dinner portion of the evening.
Luckily, I’ve cleared room in the fridge. Otherwise, the back deck makes a great cooler in winter. 4:15 p.m. Karon realizes he’s ahead of schedule. He dons a fancy “presentation” selvedge denim apron with leather detailing, which we all admire.
His thoughtful partner ordered the gift from U.S. company American Native and had the name embossed by Toronto Laser Services. 4:25 p.m. Debra realizes she can return the champagne flutes she bought for the night since she can use mine instead, bringing down her total costs. 4:30 p.m. I take a break to help my 12-year-old twin daughters primp for a friend’s party.
My husband has tactfully declined our dinner invitation, opting instead to chauffeur the girls to Vaughan. That leaves our 8-year-old in the house with the babysitter, who puts her to bed mid-party.
(The kid falls asleep like a trooper, despite the clamour.)
The tweens leave before everyone arrives and return after everyone departs.
5 p.m. Setup is complete. Carolyn returns with a lovely hostess gift: a bottle of sparkling wine, my preferred quaff.
Karon starts frying blini, the little pancakes he’ll serve with herring and sour cream to kick off dinner. He’s melting butter in a non-stick pan on my electric cooktop, several steps down from the state-of-the-art induction range in the Star’s test kitchen. 5:15 p.m. The delicious smell of frying butter permeates the house.
Alison arrives. Our daughters are best friends. Her presence is a balm. I barely know Carolyn, Debra and Karen. (Did I mention my boss coming over?) Having Alison at the other end of the table reassures me the conversation will flow; she’s smart, funny and interested in people. 5:30 p.m. Mary arrives, also with a lovely (but unnecessary) hostess gift: a bottle of red wine.
We gather in the living room. Carolyn pours flutes of non-vintage Grande Cuvée 1531 de Aimery, directing our attention to the strings of tiny bubbles it produces. Karon brings out herring-topped blini to applause.
“Aww, they’re just pancakes,” he says.
Karon has laid them out on a wooden board, very Nordic, and passes them around with paper napkins. Many guests admit they haven’t tried herring. Nonetheless, arms shoot forward to snap it up. The oily pickled fish isn’t my favourite but Karon makes it work sandwiched between warm pancake and cool sour cream. 5:40 p.m. Karen Cleveland, author of the Star’s Manners 2.0 online etiquette column, arrives bearing a tasteful scented candle.
“She’s the etiquette expert and she’s late,” Mary giggles. These things happen.
The final guest rings the bell. We are standing in the living room, laughing as Carolyn tops up our flutes with the second bottle of sparkling wine when Alex walks in. He loves herring thanks to his Romanian mother. This sparks small talk about national food preferences. 6 p.m. We sit down to our second course: citrus fennel salad, which matches beautifully with the wine. It’s a Chilean blend of Sauvignon Blanc, Viognier and Chardonnay and I like it for its name — Montes Twins, like my daughters — before I even try it.
“Risky and elegant,” is how one guest describes the combination. 6:30 p.m. Conversation flows from sport fishing to how Carolyn once sliced open a champagne bottle with a sabre, a sommelier thing. Who knew sharp metal objects would find common ground?
Debra jumps up to clear the salad plates.
The table decor is her domain and she wants it to remain a focal point. She’s also sitting closest to the kitchen, her choice since she made the seating plan. In regular circumstances, I’d prefer my guests leave the clearing and serving to the hosts. 6:50 p.m. The third course, cacio e pepe, is ready. I love this simple Roman dish of hot spaghetti boldly glossed in shaved Romano, cracked black pepper and a bit of pasta cooking water.
Karon’s version is spot on. One restaurant in Toronto charges $17 a bowl. Karon says ours “cost all of 50 cents.” Pairing it with Valpolicella, a light Venetian red with enough acidity to balance the richness, makes sense.
As we dig in, Karon begins criticizing his own cooking — “I should’ve added more pasta water” — but I stop him by quoting my husband: “Never tell your guests when something’s gone wrong. They won’t notice unless you point it out.” 7:15 p.m. Karon returns from checking the roast to find Rudi, our 18-year-old tabby, making a rare appearance amongst company by sitting in his seat. “I’ll just eat in the kitchen,” Karon says. 7:25 p.m. The meat is ready. We serve the platter European style, Karon holding the heavy dish while I dole out servings.
The pork is overcooked. I can’t fault Karon; he’s using an unfamiliar oven. The carrots, however — scrubbed but not peeled, basted in pork fat and seasoned with garlic — are fantastic. I haven’t enjoyed roasted veg this much in forever.
Portions have been manageable up to now, at least foodwise. But the wine is flowing too fast for me to write legible notes. I restrict myself to half a glass of wine No. 4, the 2013 Marchesi de’Frescobaldi Tenuta di Castiglioni, of which Carolyn has brought an extra bottle. Too bad, because the combination with the main course is yummy. 7:50 p.m. Karon returns to the kitchen to put sliced pears on puff pastry. Alex follows him and asks for the recipe. This is a good sign. 8:20 p.m. The pear tart is served. Some guests find the pastry hard to cut with the sides of their dessert forks. We pick it up and eat with our hands like pizza, keeping the mood light.
We sip the final wine, a Harvey’s Bristol Cream sherry that Carolyn serves chilled and decanted in cut crystal. She’s excited to show off this overlooked gem from a brand she says is perceived as “a bit fuddy-duddy.” We are suitably impressed.
After, we eat the juicy clementines Debra has used as place card holders. Thus we practise recycling and cleanse our palates in one go. A win for Debra’s choices. 8:35 p.m. The non-Star guests say thank-you and leave. Alison has to pay the referee at her daughter’s hockey game; Alex is meeting up with friends. Karon declares it “an appropriate time for dinner to end.”
The party winds down. All the food has been eaten, the wine drunk, the photos taken. I don’t offer coffee or tea. In other circumstances, I’d encourage further conversation over a steaming beverage.
Etiquette expert Karen shares her strategy for making a graceful early exit: “Plant a seed with a friend to suggest you go get a drink.”
Karon calls a cab. Mary takes an Uber and returns the next day for her car; she’s not the first dinner party guest to drink more than planned. (She later tells me she was nervous.) 10:10 p.m. The last guest leaves. My head hurts from all the wine. I’m wired from the conversation. Twenty minutes on the couch with Netflix settles me nicely. The dinner party was a success, creatively and logistically. The next day I think about what made our dinner party work.
For one, we came in on budget. (Granted, $250 is the monthly food outlay for some Toronto families.) Our experts came up with relatable, cost-saving ideas that didn’t look or taste frugal.
I sipped a $17.40 French sparkling wine that rivals expensive champagne. I saw how green boughs can be as pretty as a pricey bouquet of flowers. I tasted the full flavour potential of a bag of carrots that cost less than $2.
For another, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. The empty plates streaming back into the kitchen illustrated how delicious the food was; Alex later texted me for the salad recipe to impress a date. Alison put pictures on her Instagram: “It was so fun!” she emailed.
Even without a team of colleagues behind me, I’d throw this party again.
Karon’s menu is worth duplicating, as are Carolyn’s wine pairings and Debra’s tablescape. Their choices boosted the dinner to a higher level of home entertaining. But I would drop the blini in favour of a no-cook starter in order to spend more time with guests. Plus I still don’t like herring. Amy Pataki is the Star’s restaurant critic. Reach her at apataki@thestar.ca