First Timers

As you might remember from last week's post, we have been spending some time preparing to host a small get together that we held last night. With a total of seven people eating dinner over at our place, we had some rearranging and prep to do. 

Testing out the timer function on the camera so we could finally get a picture of the two of us together!

 In our apartment we have enough seating for roughly 8-9 (one office chair, two dining table chairs, one chair-height wicker basket, and a couch that can fit roughly 4-5 people). However, our dining table is round and can only fit four and I really wanted people to be able to eat at a table. And so we changed this:

into this, except that the couch was turned to face the desk (luckily the desk is shorter than the table, making it a somewhat comfortable height for those seated on the sofa):

This picture is what we woke up to this morning: a reminder of all of the fun we had with our friends (and of the few remaining dishes we still had to put in the dishwasher--not bad considering what we started with last night!).

Alright, so we found a way for everyone to have a seat at a table. But what would we eat at the table? I didn't take pictures of many things because we didn't have everything completely ready by the time people came over, and I thought it would be strange if I pulled out the camera and took some pictures as we were finishing up dishes. On the menu: chips, salsa, guacamole, tostones (fried plantains), cucumbers (with lime juice, salt, and cayenne), shredded beef tacos (with pico and cheese), rice with corn, and Sprinkles cupcakes (red velvet and lemon blueberry). The only things we didn't make ourselves were the chips, the tortillas, and the cupcakes. All that means is that if anything wasn't so great, guests could blame us. We haven't yet decided whether or not that was a crazy idea, but we wouldn't have it any other way. In fact, if I had remembered to pick up some lard we just might have made the tortillas, too!

Some tostones we made for ourselves today.

The beef for our shredded beef tacos. We covered it in spices, seared it, threw it into the crockpot, and covered it with onions. After six hours, it falls apart into delicious shredded beef.

We didn't want to lose the favor of all of those beautiful brown bits left in the pan, so we made it into a sauce by putting some stock in it to release all of the brown bits. We also added a couple of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce for flavor and poured the sauce into the crock pot.

While we had a lot of drinks available, most people stuck with margaritas, water, and rose lemonade (this is non-alcoholic and absolutely refreshing--it has a hint of ginger in it, too!).

As completely non-objective judges, we think we did alright. Making food for seven people was a little daunting not only because it was difficult to know how much food to get, but also because we wanted to make quite a few things that taste best if they are made right before they are served. We'll probably change that in the future. We hope everyone had fun, and can't wait to do this more! I'm already getting excited about the hearty meals we could put together in the fall and winter.

I was putting together a playlist (which I forgot to play, whoops!), and Mark asked me to turn around and smile for the camera. Instead, I turned around and gave the flowers some bunny ears while pointedly refusing to smile. What can I say? I take playlist creation seriously. 

They look a little nicer without the bunny ears.

Final note: it might be best to not play Cards Against Humanity at your first ever dinner party. Having never played the game before, we didn't know that. But now we do.