weekend menu

[carrie]

I am new to this site but I am really enjoying it. I am hoping to find some advice for a long weekend in Vermont. My husband and I have been recruited as chefs for this annual weekend that has featured some past culinary disasters. They wized up and figured by inviting us they'd get decent meals. Hey, I don't mind, it means I won't have to do dishes!

This month's Gourmet had an entire weekend menu, which is what I'm interested in, but the recipes were pretty fussy and time consuming. We still want time to enjoy our weekend...

Does anyone have any great ideas?

[Suzanne F]

How many people, how many meals? Any specific likes, dislikes, and/or deeply-held beliefs? any allergies? What's available locally, what might you have to bring? And what do you two like to cook?

OH, sorry, where are my manners? WELCOME! Prepare to lose much time here, and love every minute.

To get back to your question -- haven't seen Gourmet, so I don't know what your thinking about. But if you can make dishes that build on one another (that is, take part of one to make another one later), you'll save yourself a lot of work. All those opeing questions were just to get an idea of the circumstances -- such as, will you have proper cooking facilities or will you have to wing it a lot?

[carrie]

Thanks for your reply.

We should have a decent kitchen.

In Vermont I am not sure what is local at this time of year except for cheese and maple syrup! I am told there is a reliable, if small, grocery nearby.

We are expecting to be about a dozen people, and we may have 2 vegetarians. (Although I would happily ask them to eat the side dishes. )

I like the idea of building on each meal. I will give that some thought.

We usually like to cook pretty simple things, we don't want to spend our entire weekend in the kitchen. And we will probably want hearty food, as people will be doing cold weather outdoor activities, like skiing and snow shoeing.

Thanks also for the warm welcome!

[Dana]

There have been several threads of late regarding braising - short ribs, osso buco, etc. Anything along those lines would be good, hearty food. You could put the dish in the oven at lunch time, and it would be done for dinner. Mash some potatoes and toss a salad and you'd be good to go. A large gumbo or veg soup would also be good and warming after winter activities. Cornish game hens will roast quickly (throw in some carrots or other 'roastable" vegtables) while you fix a risotto ( good for the vegetarians, too). Regarding lunches, I'd make a big bowl of tuna/chicken/ham/egg salad and get some good bread, and tell them to help themselves.

Welcome. Hope you have a great weekend. Sounds like a lot of fun.

[Suzanne F]

Okay, 4 suggestions:

1) Whatever you make, cook LOTS MORE of everything than you think people will eat. Because they probably WILL eat more than normal, and because:

2) for the last meal that you have, bake a whole big bunch of potatoes, heat up any leftovers, and use them for potato toppings. A good excuse to finish up butter, sour cream, etc.

3) if there's new, clean snow, get some maple syrup to pour over it. And some good sour pickles to eat alongside. No, I am not kidding!

4) unless you've got a killer quick-and-easy biscuit recipe, don't bake. Buy all the breads, cakes, etc. You can always gussy up bought cake with a freshly-cooked fruit compote (made while you're eating the rest of the meal).

[Dana]

Quick and Easy Killer Biscuit Recipe

4 cups Bisquick

8 oz sour cream

8 oz 7up or Sprite

Mix lightly together. Roll gently, using as little flour (Bisquick) as possible. Cut in circles. Melt 1 stick butter. Dip biscuits in butter and bake for 15 min at 425 or till lightly browned. Brush with remaining butter.

This sounds kinda weird, but they are awesome.

[Jaymes]

Excellent, excellent advice already....

A few other things I did when catering ski weeks:

Bake a nice big ham. In a pinch you can work it into every single meal, as well as snacks.... ham slices for breakfast, sandwiches, dinner, cubed with cheese for snacks, takealongs for picnics or lunch up on the slopes.

Get those metal disposable baking pans and cook and freeze such crowd-pleasers as lasagne, stews (add potatoes later - I take a bag of those large-sized frozen French fries - Country Style, I think - for this purpose so that I don't have to peel and chop fresh ones), Greek Beef Stew (someone here was kind enough to tell me the "real name" but I've forgotten it - but you put spices in it like cinnamon that smell wonderful after a day in snow and ice and it freezes beautifully) chili, moussaka, sloppy joes, etc. Cleanup is a BREEZE.

Depending on where you are going from/to - I sometimes cooked hamburgers patties on my grill at home, then wrapped them individually and froze. Also good for lunches, improptu snacks.

Also, cut fruit before you go and toss it with some kind of dressing or orange juice and honey or 7up or just a little sugar. Take in ziplock baggies. Wonderful to have "all ready" for cold or hot cereal, waffles, French toast, etc.

Make caramel corn before you go. They will love you for this.

Take popcorn, as well as the stuff to make S'mores in the fireplace.

Hot chocolate mixes.

Take your crockpot and use it to simmer things while you are out all day having fun.

Also to simmer mulled cider and gluwein.

My main goal was to spend as little time as possible in the kitchen - either cooking OR cleaning up after - but still have hearty, nutritious meals everyone could enjoy.

For the vegetarians, I'd cook up some beans and cornbread and a marinated salad (maybe cucumbers and onions or something else that didn't need to be tossed at the last minute) and some kind of corn casserole that I could freeze and reheat.

Again - in a disposable metal pan.

Edited February 9, 2003 by Jaymes (log)

[KatieLoeb]

Bake a nice big ham.  In a pinch you can work it into every single meal, as well as snacks....  ham slices for breakfast, sandwiches, dinner, cubed with cheese for snacks, takealongs for picnics or lunch up on the slopes.

A corollary to the ham idea is make a big-assed roast beef. Serve hot and sliced with horseradish mashed potatoes and veg first night, then sliced for sandwiches all weekend, as well as shredded atop some spinach with a sesame-soy vinaigrette for a nice Asian salad, or with crumbled feta, cucumbers, tomatoes and red onion w/lemony vinaigrette for a Greek salad later on.

I do this all the time. Makes "leftovers" a lot less boring and makes for WAY less work the rest of the week.

[JAZ]

Having dealt with the situation of cooking for a part vegetarian crowd, I can offer a couple of suggestions on that point. If you make chili, it's not too much more trouble to make two batches, one with all meat, and another with only beans. This satisfies everyone from the no-beans-in-my-chili-dammit-I'm-from-Texas contingent to the moderates (who can mix the two) to the vegetarians. And enchiladas are another dish that's easy to make with and without meat -- make one pan of cheese only and one pan with chicken or beef.

And finally, one last general suggestion: regardless of whether you usually use it, Bisquik is a wonderful thing for vacation kitchens.

Edited February 9, 2003 by JAZ (log)

[Jaymes]

If you make chili, it's not too much more trouble to make two batches, one with all meat, and another with only beans. This satisfies everyone from the no-beans-in-my-chili-dammit-I'm-from-Texas contingent to the moderates (who can mix the two) to the vegetarians.

Excellent suggestions, I think. The enchiladas would freeze well, so that'd be another dish you could make in advance to keep yourself out of the kitchen.

And there's a "vegetarian chili" thread here on eGullet that you might want to check out.

Sounds like fun!

[pixelchef]

Something I've always found to be relatively easy, quick, and usually very crowd-pleasing is a salt-roasted chicken (roasted inside a salt crust). It always provides some drama when you bring it to the table.

Stuffed pork loin with a "winter" type stuffing is always nice and easy as well (apples, walnuts, cornbread, etc..).

For vegetarians, grilled portobellos always seem welcome. Not only will they serve as a nice side dish for the meat-eaters, but they have enough balls to 'em to serve as mains for the vegetarian crowd.

[carrie]

These are all great suggestions!

I'm starting to get some good ideas. I love stuffed pork loin and it does seem like the perfect winter dinner for a crowd.

The portabellos are right on too.

How about some side dishes that can stretch (or transform) over a couple of days?

One thing I like is creamed spinach that can be used as an omelette filling for the next day's breakfast. (Although omelettes are kind of tough for a crowd, I was thinking strata, maybe.)

Anything with potatoes?

BTW am now addicted to eGullet.

[KatieLoeb]

How about some side dishes that can stretch (or transform) over a couple of days?

How about a big pot of Ratatouille? The vegetarians will love it, everyone else can have it as a side dish, and it makes great omelette or fritatta filler next day!

Voila! Problem solved.

My work here is done...

[Anna N]

....

BTW am now addicted to eGullet. ...

Aren't we all?

[JAZ]

How about some side dishes that can stretch (or transform) over a couple of days?

One thing I like is creamed spinach that can be used as an omelette filling for the next day's breakfast.  (Although omelettes are kind of tough for a crowd, I was thinking strata, maybe.)

Anything with potatoes?

BTW am now addicted to eGullet.

Although omelets are tough to do for a crowd, frittatas and tortillas (basically Italian and Spanish versions of oven baked omelets) are not too hard. But you do have to choose your additions a little differently than you would for rolled or folded omelets, as they are baked in the eggs rather than added after the eggs are cooked.

And as for potatoes, I think they rank up there as one of the most adaptable foods ever. If you baked an oven full of them the first night, you could use the leftovers for: hash browns or home fries, corned beef or smoked chicken hash, potato salad, potato pancakes, twice baked potatoes, gratin or a potato casserole.

(Damn, now I want potatoes and I don't have any...)