The New People's Champ of Making Parties

I threw myself a party once. It went pretty well. I've arranged birthday happy hours, which involves little more than picking a location and sending an appointment in Outlook, and those went well too. I think it's because of those, um, "events" that my sister decided to turn to me to request a party for her birthday this year. She asked me before Christmas, giving me plenty of time to plan a party for somewhere around March 31st.

Did I mention she wanted it to be a surprise? Yes. She requested a surprise.

If you want great ideas on party decor, planning, and the like, there are many online resources to help you and also make you feel like a loser for not being able to execute all of the fabulous ideas, even when you start planning months in advance. I made a fabulous surprise party for my sister in April, and it was perfect. Not because I implemented all the million+one ideas that I found on the trusty interwebs, but because the end result was beautiful and great fun. I'm pretty sure that is more important than custom appetizer picks and candy buffets with professionally calligraphied (that IS a word) labels.

See my inspiration. I was feeling pretty ambitious.

I wanted flowers in mason jars and candles in big hurricane vases. I wanted to wake up knowing how to make a flower arrangement. I wanted an unlimited budget. I wanted!

I wanted to serve a few cocktails and mocktails. I NEEDED a photo wall and planned to use fabric for the background. And who doesn't want tissue flowers or poofs or lanterns or all of the above?

Other items on my (ideal) party to-do list included: finding a venue that was wheelchair accessible, coming up with activities to give us something to do (some family parties have been a little...stiff), creating the perfect playlist, getting enough indoor seating and tables (a party in Portland in April - using the outdoors is no guarantee), figuring out a way to keep the kids happy, creating and executing the perfect menu, and actually pulling off the surprise!

Here are some pictures of the actual event:

L to R, T to B: flowers and notecards for birthday wishes; buffet; bar tables with more flowers and notecards; and appetizer table with Wii (that didn't get played due to abundant sunshine)

The decor ended up being heavy on the green and light on the blue in spots, and heavy on the blue in others. We ended up not having any pretty pitchers to serve the drinks with. I think we used a regular ole' cooler when we realized we didn't have galvanized drink tubs. The indoor activities were unnecessary because the surprisingly amazing weather drew everyone outside. Lastly, I had way too much food and seating because some party guests weren't able to come.

Look at that face.

But who cares? There is definitely a middle ground between party perfection and something with as much thought and effort as a bad frat party.

The look on her face was worth every moment of planning and every plan gone awry.

We had good food, good music, great friends and family, and lots of laughs. My sister Sarah acted as head chef, and together we made potato salad, collard greens, green salad with beets and blood oranges, spicy coleslaw, carmelized onion dip, and taco dip (I promise its good). My brother-in-law provided delicious pulled pork, and we also had a fancy meats, cheeses, and olive platter.

Liz's friends helped us mix up a pom-lemonade vodka cocktail, and also had beer, sodas, and sparkling water.

It was a freakin' feast.

 
I brought what I thought was enough decorative paper to be a backdrop for the photo wall. It was not. So, no backdrop. And you can see the tape holding up the custom sign I made. Meh, what are you gonna do?

The photo wall was so fun. Those pictures are my favorite from all the party pics!

Aw, mother and daughters! Let's just pretend that my mom's eyes are open. 

Also, did I tell you that the sign is gold because it was Liz's golden birthday? She turned 31 on the 31st (of March).

Here are Liz and some party guests enjoying the day. It was so sunny and beautiful Liz could hardly see. One thing I love about Portlanders is their enthusiam for nice weather. Since most times of the year the sun rarely shines, people waste NO time in moving a party outside on a nice day. Even if that means sitting on the ground, which some people did.

Also, please note the adorable tots. My cousin is showing off her manicure, if that wasn't obvious.


We didn't get any pictures of The Liz Quiz, a trivia game I made up about my sister that I forced everyone to participate in, even my friend's boyfriend who had met Liz for the first time that day. I was quite pleased with myself.

If I do say so myself, I made a pretty badass party. Normal, not ready for a magazine shoot, but badass nonetheless. I am a normal party making champion.

You Bet Your Goulash I'm Hungarian!

Don't be embarrassed. This is just my night shirt.

In honor of my Hungarian heritage and the need for a quick dinner that would utilize my ground beef, I decided to make some (faux) gulyas while googling pictures of the Gabor sisters. I think it was a success, the goulash and the googling, so I'm going to share the search results and my recipe with you.

their souls are as intertwined as their fur

The Gabor Sisters. Um, Kardashians who? Also, did you know Eva wrote a memoir titled Orchids and Salami because that's all she kept in her fridge? OMG never been so proud to be Hungarian!

Now before I begin, I realize this probably brings up a number of questions for you. One such question might be, ANOTHER recipe? what the hell is this, some crappy food blog? No, no it's not. As you know, this blog is about all the things I think and say and do that I find interesting and fascinating. Surely, you are fascinated by stories of the things I cook, no? Another question I'm almost certain you are asking yourself is, wait a minute, this chick isn't Mexican? Don't feel bad. People make this mistake all the time. If you'd met me in person, my gargantuan stature would have given me away.

Now, back to the recipe. I actually got the idea from my very non-Hungarian friend, coworker, and soulmate Susan. I said, Sus, what can I make with ground beef besides hamburgers or meatballs? She said, I just dealt with this myself when my husband brought home a refrigerator box full of ground beef. Then we laughed. Then she told me to make goulash.

Susan's husband in the same cart he used to bring home the ground beef. Via

Traditional goulash is not made with ground beef, and it is also not usually made in 20 minutes. Hence why this recipe is faux. I needed fast and simple that day, but generally I do try to stick to tradition. See below.

Just a normal day making for realz goulash

So, based on Susan's suggestions, this recipe and its comments, and my own taste, this is what I came up with:

1 pound ground beef
1/2 medium/largeish red onion - chopped or sliced (I would have used yellow if I'd had it)
some form of garlic
16 ounces crushed tomatoes
1 1/2 tablespoons worcestershire sauce
1/2 teaspoon distilled white vinegar
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons paprika (the recipe said teaspoons, but I read it wrong. I think teaspoons wouldn't have been nearly enough. The more paprika the better!!)
1/4 tablespoon smoked hot paprika
1 teaspoon garlic salt (maybe more? I actually don't know)
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
1 (16 ounce) package noodles (egg noodles would probably be best, but all I had was some pasta. this would be tasty over rice or mashed potatoes too)
beef, chicken, or vegetable broth as needed

First I got the water going for the pasta. While waiting for it to boil, I heated a bit of butter and olive oil in the pan, and once hot, I sauteed the onions until soft and then added the beef and sprinkled it with a generous amount of garlic powder. (If you use fresh garlic, add it to the onions for the last minute or so of cooking before adding the beef.) While the beef was browning, I mixed the tomatoes with the remaining ingredients (except the pasta, obvi). I added the mixture to the beef and let it come to a boil. It seemed too thick, so I eyeballed what looked to be an appropriate amount of beef broth to thin it out without making it too thin. As I let that simmer away, I boiled the pasta. Once it was done, I drained the pasta and served it up with big spoonfuls of beefy goulashy business on top!

I think the whole thing took 20 or 25 minutes. If I had let it simmer gently for a long time, it would have been even more delicious. But, if I had done that, I probably would have needed more liquid in the sauce. So keep that in mind if you decide to do faux goulash slow and low style. Also, you could add all kinds of things to goulash, like vegetables and potatoes. Nothing says Eastern Europe like starch on starch!

Happy eating to you!

Let's Eat! Holiday Successes and Scary Looking Failures

I did a decent amount of cooking and baking this holiday season, but not all of it was successful. For example, although the cookies to the right were pretty adorable (toot, toot! that's the sound of me honking my own horn), they were kinda chewy. I'm not sure if I overworked the dough or if I didn't wrap them well enough before I iced them. There was a day between baking and icing. In any case, it wasn't my best work. The recipes are great, and I use them every Christmas. I think this was a case of user-error, so don't hesitate to give the recipes a try. They are from an old issue of Martha Stewart Living, but you can find them here on my mom's blog.

I didn't purchase any fancy treat boxes or tins for the cookies this year, especially since my boo has instructed me not to bring anything into his mother's house that might create more clutter. Every time I pass by the baskets and tins from years past, I get what he means. So instead, I put the cookies on a paper plate, wrapped some tissue paper around the plate, and tied it up with ribbon from Michael's. Ribbon from Michael's brings me a very strange amount of joy. Inside that little package sits shortbread wedges, sugar cookies with royal icing, and a little bag of truffles. See below for the shortbread recipe.

I must say, the truffles were a huge hit. I didn't have the alcohol called for by the recipe, but I did have some Cointreau and cherry brandy. I decided to divide the batch in half and make two flavors. Unfortunately, my eyeballing skills are lacking, and I didn't divide it into two equal parts. The Cointreau batch didn't have enough Cointreau, but the cherry brandy batch was a huge hit. Very delicious. There's my boo to the left, carefully rolling the cooled chocolate into balls. It's messy work, and he did it all while I cooked for Christmas Eve dinner!

You might be wondering where the scary looking failures are. The sugar cookies were an internal failure (too chewy, oh, and my first batch, too done), and the truffles clearly a success. Well, before I get to it, take a look at the one cute-packing-purchase I did make. Striped treat bags! Those pictured are cookie bags for my coworkers, but the truffles were put in similar bags and tied at the top with a ribbon. For these, I folded the bags, punched holes in the flap, and strung pieces of ribbon through to tie them up. Now, the ugly.

The in-progress picture of my green bean casserole and scalloped potatoes is here. The image of the finished product is buried deep within the darkest depths of my memory. You will have to trust my description because I will never allow you to see it.


Look at those fresh green beans, cooking away in organic vegetable stock while the onions carmelized in the pan! Or take a look at the layers and layers of potatoes just waiting for boo to get back from the store with the rest of the heavy cream! What could go wrong? EV. ER. Y. THING. Within moments of snapping this picture, I noticed that the potatoes were rapidly changing color. They had only been sliced a short while before, and although I know that potatoes can turn all funky colors after being exposed to oxygen (I think that's the deal), I never knew it could happen so quickly.

By the time I got them in the oven some were grey. I also think we sliced them way too thinly. It's possible there were too many and the cream should have covered the top layer completely. This was my first time making these by myself, and let me tell you, they sure didn't look like my grandma's. I didn't quite have enough cheese to cover the top, so the ugly bits weren't covered up. Then I took them to my boo's mom's house where they were heated and reheated at least twice. The green beans were fine except for all the reheating. By the time we ate everything, the top layer of the potatoes looked black, they were oily, and the beans were completely shriveled. Such a fail.

I think my biggest success was one I didn't get a picture of, naturally. Chipotle Bacon Deviled Eggs on New Year's Eve. Everyone agreed they were bomb. I had little knowledge of how to successfully boil and peel eggs, so finding this was a big help.

Maybe I was like a Top Chef contestant cooking his protein three ways or making an extra dish when he doesn't have to. I did too much and ended up doing few things well. Bummer.

*Here is the recipe for the shortbread, courtesy of my mom and her good sense to hold onto that Martha Stewart Living issue from nearly 10 years ago.

Shortbread Cookie Recipe - Makes 3 dozen

1 pound (4 sticks) unsalted butter (doesn't say softened but we think it should be)
1 cup firmly packed light-brown sugar
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Heat oven to 275. Grease three 8-inch springform pans. (I have only one 9-inch springform pan, so I did it in batches. I only got two batches out of the dough.) In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar on medium-high speed until light and creamy, about 2 minutes. Add vanilla and beat. Add flour and salt, beginning on low speed and increasing to medium, until flour is just combined.

2. Divide dough evenly among prepared pans. Using a spatula, spread dough out to edges of pan, making sure the tops are smooth and level. (Know that "spreading" the dough did not happen for me. The dough is not super easy to work with, and I had to use my knuckles to press it into the pan. As a result, the whole smooth and level thing didn't really work out.)

3. Lightly score dough in each pan into 12 equal wedges. (My mom uses a 10" bamboo skewer cut to the width of the pan and pressed it into the dough. I do the same. However, I did 16 equal wedges. Since my pan was a little bigger, this worked out fine, but with an 8-inch pan it would probably be a stretch.) Prick a pattern into each wedge with the tins of a fork.

4. Bake until shortbread is dry and barely golden, about 50 minutes. (I think mine was a bit overdone.) Cool on a wire rack. Using a sharp knife, follow the score marks to cut into neat wedges.