Chilly Flavours of Winter
Themed Dinner Parties, Something Wild and Shrimp Cocktail
In January, my friend Carolyn and I hosted a dinner party to celebrate one of my favourite winter flavours - pear. Subtle in taste, pears are both savoury and sweet, sometimes crunchy, at other times toothsome. An abundance of cooking possibilities.
We invited a few of our closest friends to our candlelit pear party. Carolyn and I each cooked a few dishes adhering to our one rule: pear in every course!
The Menu
I was in charge of h’ors d’oeuvres, appetizer and dessert. My goal throughout was to demonstrate the range of the pear, in both application and taste combinations.
To start, we sampled a selection of pears, served with Parmigiana Reggiano and honey, prosciutto, manchego and membrillo. The accompaniments are everything! I have written about manchego and membrillo before, but adding in a piece of pear really elevates it. I didn’t want any crackers or bread with this spread; pears were the vessel for each bite of meat, cheese or preserve. With pear-as-cracker every morsel was aromatic. A concise charcuterie board.
For the appetizer, I baked a savoury cheddar, mushroom and shallot tart, topped with Korean pear slices and a mixture of toasted pine nuts, sesame and pumpkin seeds. Inspired by a recipe from More Than Cake, a cookbook by the pastry chef Natasha Pickowicz, it was a buttery yet crisp way to begin our dinner.
To finish off our meal, I made poached pears. I love red wine poached pears and pears Belle Helene - in culinary school I made a featured dessert for the school’s restaurant with spiced poached pears, chocolate mousse cake and caramel.
This time, I poached my Bartlett pears in black pepper, lavender, cardamom and star anise. I served each pear on top of a slice of olive oil orange cake. I love to save all my citrus scraps in the freezer, and then make this Stella Parks recipe for citrus syrup. It’s a lovely bitter and pungent syrup, good for a lemon or orange drizzle cake. The citrus olive oil cake from Camilla Wynne’s newest book Nature’s Candy, is the syrup’s perfect match, it’s lover. Finally, I garnished my pears and cake with a spoon of mascarpone, maldon salt, candied ginger, and chocolate shavings.
More Flavours of Winter
Other than our pear fare affair, I have been enjoying the flavours of winter with a few epic sandwich combinations. Here are my big winners:
Popcorn
I am officially a Joan Micklin Silver head. I wrote about her film Crossing Delancey here, and recently watched Chilly Scenes of Winter. Charles Richardson (John Heard) is a civil servant living in Salt Lake City, a man obsessed with thoughts and memories of his ex-coworker and ex-lover, Laura (Mary Beth Hurt). During her and Charles’ time together, we see her as a goofy, spontaneous, confident woman. But most importantly, she is a fabulous cook! Laura whips up chocolate soufflé for Charles a couple times throughout the movie - now THAT would have me obsessing. The soufflé is sky high, and ooey gooey inside, topped with orange peel. I love how the two characters eat sitting on the floor, while the soufflé is perched on a cardboard box. A sumptuous dessert famous for its difficulty and technicality, enjoyed in such casual, bare settings. A playful scene for a film that toes the line between love’s light and easy feeling, and the depression and desperation of heartbreak.
Bonus: Ray Liotta ordering both a coke and a beer in Jonathan Demme’s Something Wild. Coke and a beer together? Something genius.
Sexy Little Snack
On Christmas Eve, I made Nathan and I shrimp cocktail. As a good Catholic girl, I don’t eat meat on Christmas Eve, and instead, indulge in the treats of the ocean. A merry and bright little lunch, served with buttered bread, eaten before an early evening screening of It’s a Wonderful Life.
While home in Vancouver in January, I made the same sexy shrimpy snack as a pre-dinner appetizer for my Nonna. Fun. Festive. Fancy. Easy. Here is my loose recipe!
Shrimp Cocktail
Ingredients
cooked prawns
lettuce (i like little gem, iceberg or butter), chiffonade
avocado (optional)
cucumber, diced
green onions, sliced
dill, picked
3 tablespoons mayonnaise
1 tablespoon ketchup
1/2 teaspoon horseradish
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2 dashes of hot sauce
splash of sherry/brandy
squeeze of lemon juice
smoked paprika
bread and butter, for serving
Method:
Combine mayonnaise, ketchup, horseradish, Worcestershire, hot sauce, sherry and lemon in a bowl. Taste and season to preference.
Mix shrimp with sauce.
Divide lettuce, cucumber, avocado, dill and green onion into individual serving dishes, and top with shrimp. Sprinkle paprika on top.
Eat with bread and butter, and enjoy!
Ciao! xoxo