Dumplings! Semifreddo! Beans! Crudo! Braised Chicken!

Two very different dinner party menus

When did hosting become such a dirty word?

Something about the word hosting elicits images of white table cloths, platters of painstakingly assembled hors d'oeuvres (let’s just call them snacks), and fussy menus. These out-of-date assumptions that there’s only one way to gather feel restrictive, even shameful, if you don’t have the bandwidth to pull out all the stops. But with the daily stressors that life brings —juggling work, kids, aging parents, a crumbling democracy—it feels more important than ever to gather with the people that fill our cups in the darkest days (literally and figuratively).

I feel firmly that having friends over doesn’t have to be over-the-top (Sarah Copeland wrote a great newsletter about this very thing a few weeks ago). Last week I hosted three girlfriends and made rice pilaf with saucy shrimp that took approximately 3 minutes to cook. That’s it. The other night I had dinner at one of my best friend’s and brought two marinated half chickens and some aioli. She made a salad and boiled potatoes and this very low-lift dinner was one of the best nights I’ve had in recent memory. One of my friends just had her second child and has found that hosting is understandable easier when there’s no set table and everyone can just grab a bowl and hang around the living room. To me, hosting, or gathering, falls on a spectrum of what your capacity is at the given moment.

That said…on a personal level, hosting is really all I want to do. I’ve joked for years that if I could get paid to host dinner parties for my friends, I would. There’s no greater joy to me than zeroing in on a group of people and creating a menu tailor-made just for them. Mention cheesecake is your favorite dessert and you can bet you’ll have it the next time you come to my house. Talk about how the downside of rural living means not having dining out options besides Italian and new American cuisine and I’ll make a Chinese take-out-inspired menu just for you.

I know my circumstances will inevitably change, but for now I’m leaning in to the luxury of having time on my side. Keep reading for two very distinct dinner party menus and my thoughts behind them.

Comfort food is always welcome

For this dinner I was cooking for 6. One of our friends is a self proclaimed picky eater, and frankly I didn’t want to stress myself out planning a menu he would like. Ryan said that I made a nearly identical dinner for this crowd last year and I thought to myself that that’s what I’m actually trying to dismantle with my stance on dinner parties. That not every dinner has to be over-the-top, that you have permission to repeat dishes, and that sometimes people just want comfort food. Across the world, every culture has their own take on chicken and rice. It’s a comfort food for a reason, and on a particularly cold and snowy week I thought it would be just the thing to warm us all up.

Here’s what I made:

• A big pot of cranberry beans simmered in a sofrito with tomatoes, and chicken stock

• Braised chicken breast (from our own chickens!) with onions, garlic, blood orange juice, brown sugar, oregano, and chicken stock

• Plain white rice with some lime zest

• A green salad with cucumbers and red onions

• Flan

Ryan said these are the best beans I’ve ever made. I think he’s right.

Trying to impress

I’m not going to lie —I was trying to impress with this dinner. I was cooking for 6 adults and 3 kids. One of the couples we’ve been friends with for a few years, and one we had over for the first time. I’ve thought these people were very cool for a few months and honestly just wanted them to think the same about me. While this one was more time consuming, I broke up the workload over a few days which took any stress out. Dumplings were filled on a Thursday while I watched the latest episode of Traitors, semifreddo was made on Friday and popped in the freezer, and pork went in the oven early Saturday morning. The only thing left until the last minute was slicing the tuna and dressing the crudo. If you’re wondering if my plan worked, I think it did.

Here’s what I made:

• Homemade dumplings filled with pork, bok choy, garlic, ginger, chile crisp, and sesame oil

• Tuna crudo with grapefruit, soy, black vinegar, and lime

• Pork shoulder larb (recipe below for paid subscribers —or find it in my cookbook To the Last Bite)

• Rice

• Mango and coconut semifreddo (find the recipe for creamsicle semifreddo that I based this on for paid subscribers below —or find it in my cookbook To the Last Bite)

The recipe for pork shoulder larb is one of my favorites from my cookbook.

Pork Shoulder Larb

Serves 8 to 10