How to Host a Supper Club + Hostess Gifts for the Holidays (Sponsored)

This post is sponsored by UncommonGoods, an online marketplace offering creatively designed, high-quality merchandise at affordable prices. (Bonus: $1 of every purchase is donated to one of several charities including City Harvest, an organization working to end hunger in New York City.) 

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When the November food magazines begin their long-awaited arrival in my mailbox, there's no denying that the season has changed. September is easier to swat away. Long, warm nights still linger for a few weeks, but October brings wind and rain with its sunshine, and the glazed turkey on the cover of Food & Wine Magazine only confirmed it. Holiday season is upon us. That means the long string of social engagements like office parties, dinner parties, and family gatherings will carry us through until the new year.

You might not be ready to make resolutions just yet, but if you're looking for a stress-free way to entertain, I have a suggestion. This post is also filled with thoughtful gift ideas for the many friends who will welcome you into their homes in the coming months. Cheers to the season! 

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Why You Should Start a Supper Club

Sometimes when we care about food so much, we can forget how to relax around it. Dinner parties become stressful endeavors where we feel the need to impress everyone, make something fancy, or at the very least, prove there's a reason why we write a blog about the meals we eat. If you're a guest, there's pressure to bring the right gift to show our appreciation. All the self-induced pressure can be debilitating, and might even convince you not to invite people over. 

Earlier this year, a friend of a friend suggested we start a supper club with some rules that would make hosting a dinner party easier than ever. The following guidelines have served us well for the past six months, and I hope they'll inspire you to consider starting your own dinner party circuit, even amidst the busy holiday season.

If you're still not convinced, W.H. Auden should help you tune in to the challenges of maintaining friendships, and why nourishing them with food is the best course of action. 

“Easy at first, the language of friendship
Is, as we soon discover,
Very difficult to speak well, a tongue
With no cognates, no resemblance
To the galimatias of nursery and bedroom,
Court rhyme or shepherd's prose,

And, unless often spoken, soon goes rusty.
Distance and duties divide us,
But absence will not seem an evil
If it make our re-meeting
A real occasion. Come when you can:
Your room will be ready.”

-from “For Friends Only,” About The House

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Supper Club Guidelines

1. Three couples. Not too big, not too small.

2. Monthly dinners; host couple rotates. Every-other month works, too. 

3. The host couple provides main course and sides; remaining couples bring appetizers and dessert.

4. Every couple brings a bottle of wine.

5. Before everyone leaves, put your next meal on the calendar and divvy up who is bringing what.

6. Themes are optional. If you're planning something specific for the main course, like Greek food, it would be worthwhile to tell your fellow diners so they can tailor appetizers and desserts accordingly.

7. Address diet restrictions. Find out any restrictions ahead of time so everyone can plan accordingly. Also, if your dairy aversion was temporary (e.g., your cleanse is over) tell the group. Ditto for real allergies or sensitivities.

8. Make it kid friendly. Babysitters are hard to come by, and if you don't let kids join the fun, you probably won't see you friends as often.

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Hostess Gifts for the Holidays

When you're a guest, don't fret about what to bring to your boss's brunch or your sister-in-law's Saturday night cocktail party. Stock up on ideas like the ones below, and you'll be prepared all season long.

 1. Slate cheese boards with chalk bring some whimsey to your cocktail hour. | 2. Give this world salt set to one host, or spread them out over several parties. | 3. Towels that celebrate your home state. | 4. A mug worth curling up with this season. | 5. A cheese keeper extends the life of your favorite appetizers

Living with Poetry | The Pursuit of Perfection + Remy's Ratatouille

After eating at The French Laundry last year, friends asked if the experience had ruined dining out for good. How could I ever step foot in another restaurant without suffering severe disappointment? This is a legitimate question, one I asked myself long before walking through the blue doors, but my response has been a confident No, it did not ruin anything. Quite the opposite, in fact.

I've never compared The French Laundry to any other restaurant. In my mind, it was a unique experience meant to be savored and remembered fondly in a category all its own. What I did compare the experience to was everything I had already learned about Thomas Keller.

For Chef Keller, urgency is what motivates his team of chef's. From the second they arrive in his kitchen, chef's are working against the clock, pushing their boundaries of creativity, and seeking to create a restaurant experience that is utterly memorable. It's not perfection itself, but the pursuit of it, that drives him.

I was reminded of this lesson during a recent pizza and wine night when we decided to watch Ratatouille. Because, of course, nothing goes better with a good meal than a film about good meals. Before turning off the television, we watched one of the bonus documentaries featuring a discussion with Thomas Keller, who developed the staring recipe, and Brad Bird, the film's director.

Chefs and directors are not very different. For Brad Bird, every day was an opportunity to make the film better. Even small changes that seemed unnecessary, like lightening the shadow in a single frame, pushed his team to create the best film possible. In the same way Bird was always thinking about the audience, Keller was developing a ratatouille recipe to please the senses. A diner eats with his eyes first, smells the comforting aroma of roasted peppers and sweet tomatoes. This meal was being served to an audience of millions around the world, who would hopefully leave the theatre hungry for French cuisine.

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“Works of art imitate and provoke other works of art, the process is the source of art itself.” 

― Edward Hirsch, author of How to Read a Poem, and Fall in Love With Poetry

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A similar approach is taken by writers. Perfection is illusive most days. (All days?) We mostly strive for excellence, a strong sentence, a well-placed word at the end of a poem. We strive for feeling the a sense of purpose that fills our soul.   

You could say a good meal, a good film, a piece of art that makes you sigh, these are all versions of poetry. After all, what is poetry anyway? Poetry is an emotional response to the mighty world we live in. Poetry is composed, it is the right series of words strung together, the best you have to offer. So it art. So is life. We are always tumbling towards perfection, not with the goal of attaining it, but because the journey, the work, brings enough satisfaction to get you out of bed every morning. 

Remy's Ratatouille

Inspired by Thomas Keller and various adapted internet recipes, including this one.  

I've seen Pixar's film a handful of times, and each time I've left craving ratatouille, obviously. This time, I decided to do something about it. An internet search turned up inconsistencies in the recipes claiming to be Thomas Keller's version of the film's ratatouille. The Pixar message boards include the proper name of the dish, Confit Byaidi, but include instructions using eggplant, yet failed to include eggplant in the ingredient list. Hmm. Deb made a lovely version, (her interpretation of the star dish) but peppers are layered among the vegetables instead of flavoring the sauce.

Keller's version was inspired by a recipe in The French Laundry Cookbook, and includes two sauces. First, a tomato and pepper sauce that the vegetables are nestled in, and second, a vinaigrette to drizzle over the top.  

*Be aware that this dish takes about 2 1/2 hours to cook, plus prep time, so it's an ideal project to prepare throughout the day.  

For the pepper sauce
1/2 yellow pepper, seeds and ribs removed
1/2 orange pepper, seeds and ribs removed
1/2 red pepper, seeds and ribs removed
Extra-virgin olive oil
1 large garlic clove, mined
1/2 small onion, roughly chopped
1 14.5-ounce can San Marzano tomatoes
Salt and freshly ground pepper
5 sprigs thyme, divided
2 sprigs parsley
1 bay leaf

For the ratatouille
1 large Japanese eggplant
1 large zucchini
1 large yellow squash
4 to 5 roma tomatoes
1 to 2 teaspoons aged balsamic vinegar

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. Place the peppers cut-side down on a foil-lined baking sheet, and roast until tender and the skins begin to loosen, about 20 minutes. Remove and let rest until cool enough to touch, then roughly chop. 

Reduce the oven temperature to 275 degrees F. 

Add 2 tablespoons of oil to a 10-inch cast iron skillet and warm over low heat. Add the garlic, onion, and season with a pinch of salt and pepper. Cook until soft but not browned, about 8 minutes. Add the tomatoes and their juices, two sprigs of thyme, the parsley, and bay leaf. Simmer until very little liquid remains, about 10-15 minutes.  Add the chopped peppers and simmer for another couple of minutes. Season to taste with salt, discard herbs, and turn off the heat.

Allow the sauce to cool slightly, then add to a blender. Puree until very smooth and season with additional salt and pepper. Reserve 1/4 cup of sauce for the vinaigrette, and pour the rest in the bottom of the cast-iron pan. 

While the sauce cooks, it's a good time to prepare your vegetables. Thinly slice the eggplant, zucchini and squash on a mandoline and place in a large bowl. Thinly slice the tomatoes with a sharp pairing knife. Don't worry if a few slices fall apart, they can still be used! 

Think of the next step as a meditation. You'll spend between five and ten minutes neatly arranging slices of vegetables around a pan, overlapping them ever so slightly. It might feel tedious, but see if you can find some joy in it. This is cooking. 

Starting from the outer edge of the pan, arrange alternating slices of tomatoes, zucchini, squash, and eggplant. Allow the slices to overlap so that about 1/4-inch of each slice is exposed. Repeat until the pan is filled. If you run out of zucchini, keep moving forward without it. If you complete two rounds and have extra yellow squash, fill the small opening with it. Don't worry if some of your tomato slices are too thin or too thick. It is a peasant dish, after all. The end result, will be beautiful, regardless. 

Scatter the remaining thyme slices over the top and drizzle with 1 to 2 tablespoons of oil. Season with 1/2 teaspoon of salt and a few grinds of pepper. Cover the pan with foil and bake until the vegetables are tender, about 2 hours. Uncover and bake for another 30 minutes. 

To make the vinaigrette, combine the reserved pepper sauce with 1 tablespoon oil and balsamic vinegar. Whisk together, then drizzle around the plate just before serving. 

Living With Poetry | Following the Words to Shore

Writers have this tendency. It's spurred by fear or guilt or shame or an utter lack of confidence. It's rooted deep within our souls, jousting with our innate impulse to create. Most writers, if you ask, will admit to being constantly at war with their desire to write and the pull of "what they should be doing." Writers have this tendency to consider themselves not worthy, not good enough, not writers. But you are. But I am.

I share this as a reminder, because after I finished graduate school and stopped writing poetry, I didn't feel like a writer again for a long time. Even while writing my old food blog, Cooking After Five. I didn't feel like a writer because I was writing about food, something I had never done before and with so little experience, I couldn't possibly be a writer, could I? It was only after coming here, to Eat This Poem, that I've felt comfortable enough to say it out loud for the first time in six years: I am a writer. 

All this came about because of a lunchtime conversation I recently had with a co-worker and friend where we discussed balancing our writing and professional lives. We also talked about poetry, and why we're so drawn to it now. (Reasons included its calming effects, that it forces you to pause, and its ability to be ingested in short doses.) Having grown up, our writing has transitioned from waves constantly lapping at the shore to a dry stream, not unlike the Los Angeles river. There have been false starts, occasional bouts of inspiration, and months of writing nothing at all except work emails or reports. The thing is, we like what we do. We work in a field we're passionate about. We don't want to sit in a cabin all day with a notebook. It's just that our love of writing has been pushed to lunch breaks, evenings, and weekends. Life happens.

But something occurred to me that gave me a great amount of peace.  Our writing changes because our lives change. What doesn't change is our instinct, our desire to create, explain, understand. The words are simply waiting for us to make the first move. We must let go of who we once were and what our former writing life contained. Only then can we redefine what it will look like now and in the future. 

We might still live with a book of poetry tucked in our purses, on our phones, or piled on our night stands. We might not write as often. We might write something other than what brought us to writing in the first place. We might write a blog, or a screenplay, or book reviews, or the brochure for a fundraiser at our child's school, but we're still writing. Look at your writing life differently and imagine something new. This freedom will taste sweet, like the words of this poem by a former professor of mine, Barry Spacks.

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Mela

Mela, mela, how it pleases.
Greek for "honey" - word so small
you can write it in the cold hard sand
in the time between two waves.

from The Hope of the Air

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Let's remember this: If you've ever had a creative urge, drive, force, moment of clarity, moment of feeling compelled beyond reason, or electrical surge through your body that physically moves you to another room where you can write with abandon and in the full knowledge of doing just what you were meant to do in that moment, then you are a writer. Because you say you are, know you are, and because not writing would be so unbearable that you decide you can be brave, just this once. You can utter the words, even to yourself, in solitude, (I am a writer.  I am a writer) and follow the words to shore.