Yesterday I had the pleasure of going to a bridal shower. This shower was not the ordinary eat a filling lunch; watch the opening of endless gifts and then on to an "ok" cake...this shower was called a Kitchen Luncheon Shower! First, the weather that had been predicted to be raining and cool was actually sunny and warm (around 60 degrees), this of course added to the festiveness of the day! The home was lovely. It was in Rowayton, in a house that was totally remodelled with the most up-to-date kitchen I have seen in a long time. What was nice about it was you could see that the kitchen was used! In today's world that is a very nice thing since it doesn't seem to be the trend. I was standing next to the hostess at one point and asked her if the square stainless steel unit in the island was the microwave. No, she responded, that is the steam oven. It seems that steam ovens are used when you bake bread! Well, with everything that she had (including the full sized Wolf range) she did not have a foot pedal for her sink! Oh, these silly women, $200 and you can be a happy camper!
The "entertainment" for the day was a local woman who writes a cooking column for the Stamford Advocate, Ronnie Fein. Ronnie made spanikoptia; delicious chicken salad with Israeli cous cous, oranges, pistachios and a vinaigrette dressing. The interesting suggestion she made for the spanikoptia (Gini, sorry if I've messed up the spelling) was that for a meat meal for Passover, you could leave out the cheese, put in mushrooms and put matzo on the top. The method would be to soak the matzo in water then put it between 2 towels to dry it out and place on top of the spinach mixture. Then brush olive oil on the top so the matzo would brown and be crunchy. Once all the preparation was done you could then freeze everything before cooking. I had read a recipe from a Joan Nathan book where she made a tsimmes (mixture of dried fruit, sweet potatoes and carrots, some people put meat in, I leave mine vegetarian) and put the "batter" for matzo balls on top. I was thinking this could be interesting for the spinach since you would be able to give it more flavor than just the plain matzo. Anyway, I digress, let's continue with the Shower!
After lunch, which was the food Ronnie had prepared; we went into the living room and watch the bride open her gifts. I remember some 40 years ago at one of my showers, my mother and her friends saying now they could use a shower! Well, that's what I was thinking as I saw the beautiful gifts being opened! it seems that the bride had put chocolate brownies on her list so, one woman gave the bride a beautiful, LARGE tray with at least 4 dozen brownies! Of course we all at the decadent brownies!
Desert was divine! There was a cake called an Opera Cake that was like a richer, creamier Tiramisu. I had a little sliver and could barely eat it, it was so very rich!
BTW (by the way) don't you just love the bride centerpiece?????
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