Cookbook Project: Cooking for company

We had an amazing reason to celebrate this past weekend as we passed the two-week-post-vaccine date for everyone in my house and for a couple of our closest friends. Naturally, we chose to celebrate by having people over and inside (!!) for dinner for the first time since we moved into our house over a year ago.

I also chose to celebrate by making a BUNCH of food. Far too much for four people. We’re talking leftovers for days.

#1. Date Night In

I actually only used one cookbook for everything, but it’s one of my favorites. The author sets full menus, with multiple dishes, so I just picked one of those that I hadn’t made anything from before and was on my way! The menu this time included thyme lemonade, some small antipasto dishes, a panzanella salad, and a peach dessert. I don’t think there was a weak recipe in the bunch.

All the different recipes also meant I had an excuse to use almost all of the beautiful pottery in our kitchen.

First up: roasted red peppers and lemony white beans. The pepper dish called for anchovies, but since I don’t eat fish, I swapped those for miso paste instead.

Panzanella, pre-assembly. The recipe includes both roasted and raw cherry tomatoes, peaches, and a healthy dose of goat cheese. These are the leftovers I’m most excited about!

How could you not be excited about this salad?

Peaches and ginger with brown butter graham crackers and whipped cream (plus a peek at the thyme lemonade in the background!).

Honestly, we probably could have had any food and felt like this was the meal of the year because we were just so overjoyed to be able to have friends over and hang out again. However, I have missed making food for people and hosting dinner parties so much that I knew I wanted to go all out on the food and make something special like this. I’m so happy to be able to do this again!