In perhaps the only act of real journalism still happening in The Washington Post’s newsroom, food reporter Emily Heil wrote last month about her experience recreating one of Martha Stewart’s over-the-top dinner party tableaux. The “neoclassic dinner for eight,” consisting of homemade puff pastry straws, stuffed artichokes, roast lamb, carrot puree, peeled tomatoes, bread, and raspberry mousse, demanded 16 hours of prep and $550.
Unfortunately, The Federalist does not have a research department bankrolled by Jeff Bezos, and I have neither the time, financial excess, nor skill to offer a play-by-play of Stewart’s “midnight omelet supper for 30” or any of the other menus in her cookbook. The best I can offer are some favorite, when-company-comes-over recipes that make up for my lack of talent — do-ahead, hard-to-mess-up combinations with just enough effort involved to turn a weeknight gathering into a memorable meal.
French Food at Its Easiest
Well, second-easiest — this requires a bit more effort than Jenny Meyer’s “Dinner Mon Dieu” in Better Off Dead — but I guarantee it will taste much better (and still won’t require the talents of Julia Child).
For starters: I’ve gotten into the habit of serving an hors d’oeuvre before dinner, mostly because I’m always running behind and need something for people to munch on while I wrap things up in the kitchen. My favorite is always a crowd-pleaser, and it’s so simple it truly doesn’t need a recipe — top a wheel of Brie with fig jam and fresh thyme, wrap it in puff pastry or crescent roll dough, and bake at somewhere between 350 and 400 degrees until the dough is golden brown. (This recipe is the closest I could find; it adds a few extra steps that are nice but not necessary, like the egg wash and scoring the rind.) It takes minutes to assemble, or can be prepped ahead of time and kept in the fridge until you’re ready to bake it.
To drink: Serve with your cocktail of choice, if desired — last time we paired this with amaretto sours and espresso martinis — and set aside a bottle of French red wine to go with dinner. (I picked this $7 Trader Joe’s blend because the bottle was pretty, so don’t look to me for recommendations on this front!)
The main: Follow up your baked Brie en croûte with The Recipe Critic’s crockpot take on Beef Bourguignon for your main course. The most intensive part is searing pieces of cubed chuck roast and making a five-ingredient sauce — all that’s left after that is throwing the ingredients into a crockpot and letting it sit all day. I make it the morning of, but you can also prepare it up to a few days in advance. The recipe calls for baby potatoes, but I skipped those in favor of garlic mashed potatoes for a side, which can also be made in advance.
For dessert: My go-tos are this crème brûlée (I promise it’s not as intimidating as it looks!) or these pots de crème. For the former, if you don’t have vanilla beans on hand, it tastes just as good with vanilla paste or extract. (Also, the water bath is much easier if you use a small pitcher to pour water into the roasting pan after you’ve put it in the oven.) Prep a day or two ahead of time, and torch the tops right before serving.
For an even easier option, Cookie and Kate’s pots de crème come together in the blender and can also be prepped up to a few days in advance. She says you can freeze them for up to three months, but I wouldn’t know because they never last that long in my home. Her recipe does call for raw eggs, as God and George Washington intended.
(Learn from my mistake and measure all your ingredients. If you use too much liquid, it will be runny. Thankfully it’s also an easy mistake to fix — like most things, this problem can be solved by the addition of more chocolate.)
For your listening pleasure: Complete the ambiance with Fitzgerald and Armstrong’s eponymous album, Ella and Louis.
Italian Classics
The star of this meal is the lasagna, which my husband asked me to make for his birthday this year. I picked the other courses for said birthday dinner because they were also vaguely Italian, and now I’m realizing they’re all dishes that involve layering things, which is a little bit weirder of a dinner party theme.
For starters: I haven’t tried making this caprese salad ahead of time, but it comes together in about the amount of time it would take you to pull something out of the fridge. Slice fresh mozzarella and tomatoes, layer them with basil, and drizzle with olive oil or balsamic glaze. (I doubled the amount of cheese in this recipe to get enough slices since I don’t have a cheese slicer or mandolin to cut them thin.)
To drink: Are Hugo spritzes basic now? At any rate, they’re tasty, and a nice counter to rich, heavy pasta. And red wine with dinner, natch.
The main: My mother made this lasagna all the time when I was growing up, and I love it even more as an adult. It takes a few hours, but the majority of that time is spent letting the sauce simmer, so you can clean up and/or get other things done while you wait. Sitting in the fridge for a few days ahead of time only makes it better — and if you have a big enough Dutch oven or soup pot, you can double the proportions and freeze a lasagna for later.
For dessert: I’m not the biggest fan of tiramisu, but I made it with this meal because my husband loves it — and this recipe from What’s Gaby Cooking has changed my mind. Adding cocoa powder and dark rum to the espresso, as she advises, helps balance out the sickly-sweet taste that tiramisu can sometimes have. Plus, if you’re like me and won’t buy an electric mixer because you don’t believe in unitaskers, making this tiramisu will also double as your workout for the week!
For your listening pleasure: Anything by Dean Martin, or this Spotify playlist.
Elle Purnell is the assignment editor at The Federalist. She has appeared on Fox Business and Newsmax, and her work has been featured by RealClearPolitics, the Tampa Bay Times, and the Independent Women’s Forum. She received her B.A. in government with a minor in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @_ellepurnell.
