One thing I really love to do is to invite people to my house for dinner. Sadly, now that I'm teaching school full-time, writing a blog, and also writing a few posts a week for Blogher, it's something I don't have time to do as often as I'd like. However, I'd love to think that people all over the world are having dinner with me virtually as they read the blog and see what I'm cooking. I've been lucky enough to have two experiences of meeting a few food bloggers in person, and I've met many more online. If any of these friends ever came to Salt Lake, you can be sure I'd love to cook a wonderful dinner for them.
Even if you're not a food blogger, I hope you'll enjoy seeing some of the things I might serve at such a dinner. This fun blogging event was created by Angelika from The Flying Apple, and I was tagged by Karina from Gluten Free Goddess, two of the bloggers I'd love to cook dinner for! Ladies, please let me know if you're ever going to be in Utah!
Appetizers Before Dinner
Of course you need something tasty for guests to nibble on while they're waiting for dinner, so I'd serve them some of this wonderful Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto spread on 100% whole wheat pita bread, with a little something to drink, of course.
Salad Course
I do like the European tradition of having the salad after the meal, but for a simple American dinner I'd have the salad first, with some 100% whole wheat bread. Hopefully they'd be coming when there were tomatoes in the garden, so we could have Sliced Tomato, Olive, and Goat Cheese Salad with Onion-Caper Vinaigrette. Another good possibility might be Spinach and Sorrel Chopped Salad with Pecans and Goat Cheese.
Main Courses
Of course, I'd probably be grilling, if the weather permits. If there were no cilantro-haters coming to dinner, it would be hard to beat my newly discovered recipe for Grilled Halibut with Garlic-Cilantro Sauce. This would taste great with Brown and Wild Rice with Pine Nuts and Thyme.
I do realize that some people don't like cilantro, in fact some of my best friends are cilantro haters, so another option would be Baked Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Basil, and Goat Cheese. This could be baking while the halibut was grilling.
Vegetables
Of course I'd need to have some kind of vegetable, and something like Roasted Squash with Garlic would be easy to throw in the oven with the chicken. And just to offer another option for a vegetable that would taste great with anything, how about Twice Baked Cauliflower?
Dessert
If you check my recipe archives, you'll quickly figure out that desserts are not my specialty, but for a special occasion like this I'd want to have a little something sweet after the meal. Maybe something like Low Carb Cheesecake would surprise my food blogger friends with how tasty it is?
There's my menu. Now I'd better get into the kitchen and start cooking. I'm going to tag all the food bloggers I recently met in St. Louis:
Bruno from Zinfully Delicious
Gunjan from Vyanjanaa
Lisa from Champaign Taste
Nupur from One Hot Stove
Karen of Family Style
And of course my good friend Alanna from A Veggie Venture, although I know she's already been tagged. (I know a few of you guys are even busier than I am, so only if you want to do it, no pressure.)
Appetizers Before Dinner
Of course you need something tasty for guests to nibble on while they're waiting for dinner, so I'd serve them some of this wonderful Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto spread on 100% whole wheat pita bread, with a little something to drink, of course.Salad Course
I do like the European tradition of having the salad after the meal, but for a simple American dinner I'd have the salad first, with some 100% whole wheat bread. Hopefully they'd be coming when there were tomatoes in the garden, so we could have Sliced Tomato, Olive, and Goat Cheese Salad with Onion-Caper Vinaigrette. Another good possibility might be Spinach and Sorrel Chopped Salad with Pecans and Goat Cheese.Main Courses
Of course, I'd probably be grilling, if the weather permits. If there were no cilantro-haters coming to dinner, it would be hard to beat my newly discovered recipe for Grilled Halibut with Garlic-Cilantro Sauce. This would taste great with Brown and Wild Rice with Pine Nuts and Thyme.
I do realize that some people don't like cilantro, in fact some of my best friends are cilantro haters, so another option would be Baked Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Basil, and Goat Cheese. This could be baking while the halibut was grilling.Vegetables
Of course I'd need to have some kind of vegetable, and something like Roasted Squash with Garlic would be easy to throw in the oven with the chicken. And just to offer another option for a vegetable that would taste great with anything, how about Twice Baked Cauliflower?Dessert
If you check my recipe archives, you'll quickly figure out that desserts are not my specialty, but for a special occasion like this I'd want to have a little something sweet after the meal. Maybe something like Low Carb Cheesecake would surprise my food blogger friends with how tasty it is?There's my menu. Now I'd better get into the kitchen and start cooking. I'm going to tag all the food bloggers I recently met in St. Louis:
Bruno from Zinfully Delicious
Gunjan from Vyanjanaa
Lisa from Champaign Taste
Nupur from One Hot Stove
Karen of Family Style
And of course my good friend Alanna from A Veggie Venture, although I know she's already been tagged. (I know a few of you guys are even busier than I am, so only if you want to do it, no pressure.)
9 comments:
Kalyn ! I love the sound of this menu. Hard to believe that all of these tasty dishes belong to a "diet" ! I'll be the happiest (and luckiest) person to be invited to such a great dinner, and - one day I will be there ! Oh yes ! Thanks for participating, angelika
PS: Your menu will be added to my list tomorrow or on Monday at the latest.
Oh yum! This looks like an absolute feast that I'd love to take part in!
Angelika, if you ate all this at one meal, it wouldn't be much of a diet. But in smaller doses, it would be ok. I do hope you are here some day, and I want to come to Europe and stop and see you too!
Ellie, thanks, wish you could come too!
Well, it's 11:30 pm, I've eaten everything I am going to eat for the day, and you've just made me hungry all over again! I'd taste it all, even the cilantro which I have actually come to like in certain recipes : )
This looks immediately appealing - all the healthy benefits, but still delicious!
Hi Kalyn, I'm leaving town for a week so I'll have to do this when I return. Your dinner looked great!
I'll eat in Kalyn's kitchen any time ... ;-)
Maybe we should do dinner sometime?? We live close enough:)
I am so-o-o tardy in commenting here. Please forgive me, Kalyn.
What a terrific-sounding menu; and with photos, no less! Nice.
Thanks so much for participating [I *know* how busy you are!].
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