Christmas came early to Hey Pesto! this year – with my first ever full day ‘lifestyle’ course on ‘Getting Ready for Christmas’
There was great fun organising everything – turning my living room into a ‘pop-up’ dining room and my garden into a temporary flower shop!
- Canapés – Crab & avocado tartlets, sticky cocktail sausages, brie & red onion marmalade tartlets and coronation turkey vol-au-vents
- Starter – Chestnut soup with crispy bacon
- Main – Risotto stuffed quail, celeriac & potato gratin, jazzed-up parsnip mash, caramelised potatoes & chestnuts, apricot & hazelnut stuffing balls
- Dessert – Christmas pudding ice cream
After a few last minute vegetable cooking, the guests (yes they were upgraded for lunch!)adjourned to my ‘new’ dining room where lunch was served to them.
I have to apologise for the lack of colour on the main course plate – I concentrated more on different ways of cooking the vegetables rather than working on the colour! In ‘real life’ I would probably serve something like red cabbage with the quail to add colour! There was a debate over gravy – it’s not a tradition in our house so I never think of including it!
Thanks to Kate for taking the photos at lunch – we were busy turning the kitchen into a flower arranging room!
Once the guests were fed and ‘watered’ they reverted to students and Joanie from Flower Rangers took over – introducing us to the art of flower arranging and seasonal centrepieces.
We rounded off the afternoon with more tea with vanilla shortbread, gingerbread cookies and more mince pies.
After much hilarity everyone left happy with their goody bags and recipe booklets.
And once the tidying up was done Joanie and I celebrated a job well done
A big special thanks to my sous – chef James who played a blinder – I hope he remembers me when he’s famous!
Now the question is – do we do it all again?!
Hey Pesto! 