Dinner Thyme

The first time I had a dinner party, I was pretty chicken about having people over. See for starters I was going to do it all from scratch, and when you do it like that, it can cost and almond a leg. I even googled what you have to do to make butter, and the whole process leaves little margarine for error, which really made my stomach churn. See my friends have pretty high standards, if I put on a crumby dinner party, I'd get a roasting. The steaks were high to say the least. 

I was thinking of doing a poultry dish, but wasn't sure if I could wing it; it could be a huge cock up if I got it wrong so I went to the fish market to see what was the catch. I asked the monger, whose name was Gill, what he recommended for a dinner party since I didn't know what I could flounder, so he snapped something and put it on the scales. Just as I was thinking his metric system seemed a bit fishy I remembered I had invited Drew, who was vegetarian. He'd only just become a veggie because he couldn't make ends meat. Well that made my fish plans sink, so I just hoped that on this rare occasion that I was having my first dinner party, he might just eat meat.

I was getting stressed; my list was too long, I had too much on my plate, so broke my plan into bite sized pieces and decided to do a tapas style dinner instead, allocating the starters and dessert to my friends. I relished the fact that I'd mustard the strength to split up the tasks so I could ketchup on lost time. Some might say that bring-a-plate style lacks taste, I say it's a good way for a first time host like myself to have their cake and eat it too. 

Basket jam packed, I set off along my whey, brie-fly visiting the delicatessen (though it was so crowded I wondered if I camembert-it) I went to take a sample but the lady behind the counter slapped my hand and said "That's nacho cheese!"
It a-pear'd that sample wasn't free after all. I wanted to fig-ure out a way to stop feeling so blue about the hours ahead, so I thought about my sweet friends I had invited.

I whisked inside and started scrambling around for spoons, ingredients etc. I almost boiled over when I saw that I forgot to buy aluminum. 30 min before guests arrive and my plans were foiled. Just when it was crunch time, I put the potato chips in the bowl; and the first guest arrived.....

It was Anna. Anna, thank goodness, bought the wine. I'd heard through the grapevine Anna knows her wines, and although I wanted to whine about how I feel like I've been scraping the barrel, I just downed a glass and then felt grape.

Then came Emma and her boyfriend, Keith, who I hadn't met. They were on starters, and as soon as Keith walked in with a bunch of flours I knew we'd be the pesto friends. Emma had made pickles but spilt it on her top so I guess you could say she was in a bit of a dil-emma.

Then Beth arrived. Beth is a good egg, we are great friends and I always crackup at her yolks. She made some sort of amazing chocolate torte, I told her I didn't know how she did it, she told me it was a piece of cake. Icecreamed when she said was on a diet, coz for someone who didn't find oranges a-peeling, I found that hard to swallow. To say I was a trifle concerned about how successful this diet would be is pudding it nicely.

When Drew, the final guest came with non-alcoholic-punch, I knew that inviting a vegetarian was a missed steak. Drew, the food snob of the group, looked around and told me "I yam impressed, orange you glad you decided to savour the delight that is dinner party hosting? The tapas look sub-lime!"

The conversation wasn't corny, we talked till our voices went husky.

Jj