The ponzu, honey, and ginger sauce is salty, sweet, and acidic and has a wonderful umami taste.

The group sitting down to enjoy the first course.

Our guests....

I was supposed to serve the crab croquette with the Hamachi Crudo but during platting I decided to serve both dish separately.

Here I am telling our friends that I deviated a bit from the menu.

Course #2: Shrimp croquette with crab salad on endive

Phu loves my croquette and he requested it so it is in the menu.  I paired the croquette with a crab salad on Endive.

Beside the croquette, the crab salad is also a hit.  Fresh lump crab meat salad (I mixed the crab meat with a citrus vinaigrette) and it really enhanced the taste of the crab meat.

Close view of the dish

Course #3: Roasted sweet potatoes, shishito peppers, squid tempura, Tahini, greens, Harissa vinaigrette

What a vibrant dish!

The roasted sweet potatoes (yam & sweet potatoes) are incredible sweet!

The roasted asparagus and shishito peppers are just perfect and so tasty.  The tahini sauce is also perfect for the roasted vegetables.

The tempura squid added an nice crunch, the Harissa vinaigrette is a little spicy and I like everything on this plate.

Making a salad is the winter is not easy as there are not a lot of choices for vegetables, but using and roasted root vegetable is so tasty and really elevate the dish.

Course #4: Squid ink tagliatelle, braised squid, broccoli crema & Pan grattato

I wanted to have a pasta on the menu but I wanted something unusual so I selected squid ink tagliatelle.

This dish is inspired by SPQR restaurant in San Francisco (1 Michelin star )

According to SPQR, this dish reflects the sea, and changes as you eat it.

the first bite could be briny, the next creamy, the next crunchy.

Close look at the dish.

Course #5: Salmon confit with fennel salad

This dish is from Tetsuya Wakuda, a renowned chef in Australia.

Tetsuya’s cuisine makes use of Australian ingredients and fine Australian, Japanese and classic French food preparation techniques. The Confit of Ocean Trout (I replaced it with Salmon) is the signature dish of Tetsuya’s and it is commonly referred to as the most photographed dish in the world. This popular dish has been on the menu for over two decades.

The Salmon is confit in olive oil (cooked a low temperature in oil).  The top of the salmon is filled with Wakame (a crispy seaweed),  served with a fennel salad, and garnish with Parley oil, and Ikura.

The colors are definitely gorgeous!

Course #6: Roasted Guinea fowl legs, roasted shitake in mustard cream

We love Guinea fowl and this dish was a nice end to a meal.

Classic French dish with a nice mustard cream sauce that was just perfect! that did not disappoint!

Hoa and I enjoying the last dish of the evening.

And of course lots and lots of conversations during the meal!

Cheers to great meal with friends!

Wine and sake we drank during the course of the evening...

Cake tasting...

I ordered a bunch of bundtinis from Nothing from bundt cakes (center and right up).

There are 4 flavors: Lemon cake, red velvet, chocolate with chocolate chips, and pumpkin.

The two favorite is Red velvet and chocolate on chocolate chips.  The pumpkin flavor was not that great.

2 inches Cheese cakes - In the back is the Pumpkin cheese cake and in the front is the New York Cheese cake.

Here is an assortment of mini cakes:

On the left is the Raspberry Dark chocolate mousse, in the center is a New york cheese cake bite, and on the right is an Almond hazelnut mini cake

in the middle left is an hazelnut mouse with chocolate mini cake, in the center is a Chocolate supreme mini cake, and on top is a Passion strawberry mini cake.

After tasting all these different cakes, cheesecake, etc... I ordered the  Raspberry Dark chocolate mousse, Almond hazelnut mini cake, the chocolate supreme mini cake and the bundtinis.

It was much fun tasting all these cakes and thanks everyone for your recommendations.

Next... Our Guests

Filed under: Dinner Parties