“Attire Should Match The Elegance Of The Evening”

Have you ever been part of a debate over the dress requirement for an evening or event? This usually isn’t a supper club issue, but it isn’t uncommon either.

In my former life at Kraft we were hosting an event at a Research Chefs Association trade show in Montreal. The venue for the event was magnificent and our budget wasn’t. We staged the event doing a lot of the work ourselves. As we were developing the invitation for the event we had a healthy debate about what we should tell people to wear. Our Marketing department wanted to require formal attire. Our Sales department wanted to keep it business casual. In the middle of the debate one of our Sous Chefs walked over to a black board and wrote:

“ATTIRE SHOULD MATCH THE ELEGANCE OF THE EVENING”

The debate was instantly over. The invitations went out and our event became the “Go to” event of the show.

Check out the video on the event.

I can remember showing the invitation to my then 85 year old mother. Her reaction was: “Who wrote this? It is simply brilliant!” I told her that our chef Amanda had written it. She said: “A chef wrote this? She should be writing your advertising copy”. I probably should explain that past being a great chef, Amanda is also really gifted. She did get a degree in English Literature before deciding to enter the culinary world. It was fun working with such sharp people.

One lesson I did learn about invitations from the corporate world that does carryover into supper clubs is that all invitations should state:

DATE:

TIME:

PLACE:

Those three requirements are critical and I am consistently amazed how many times they get left off. I heard a similar story last week. The head of HR at a local company was telling me how he received a resume from a student from a major University that had lots of wonderful information, but no name on it. You can debate dress, what to bring, and RSVP requirements, but you can’t forget the date, time and place.

And, if you have trouble with the wording of the invitation, defer to the chef with a degree in English literature.

If you enjoyed this blog and similar other stories/supper club lessons follow me on Facebook and Twitter and subscribe to get future blogs at www.impromptufridaynights.com/blog and check out my book Impromptu Friday Nights a Guide to Supper Clubs. Published by Morgan James Publishing and available through most channels where books are sold.

Morgan James Red Carpet Event

I was honored to be part of Morgan James Red Carpet event last week in Nashville. Morgan James is the publisher of Impromptu Friday Nights – A Guide To Supper Clubs and they hosted an event for 17 of their recently published authors.

The authors present were a very impressive group with CEO’s, CFO, doctors and people with amazing life stories. The cornerstone of the event was a live TV stream where the authors were interviewed about their books. With all these high-powered people, who did they pick to go first?, the “Party Guy” with his hopefully humorous book about socializing over a meal.

Here is a link to the live stream of the event.

The whole event was a lot of fun. Nashville is city exploding with excitement. Once a sleepy southern town, today it is a trendy city with an amazing array of entertainment options. With country music, professional sports, night life , restaurants and more it is a great place to visit. It is also the home of Ingram Content Group that is a global leader of book sales, distribution and production. Meeting Ingram representatives was very helpful for first time authors as they build an understanding of the book business.

The second day of the event was designed to help educate the authors on what it takes to market their books. It isn’t easy as even books like “Chicken Soup for the Soul” took two years before anyone bought it. The publisher also dropped the fact that it usually takes two or three books to be published before anyone takes notice. Authors like John Grisham and J.K. Rowling were on book three before anyone bought into book one. So you can expect to hear about “Impromptu Friday Nights – A Guide To Wine Clubs” in the not so near future.

If you enjoyed this blog and similar other stories/supper club lessons subscribe to get future blogs at www.impromptufridaynights.com/blog and check out my book Impromptu Friday Nights a Guide to Supper Clubs. Published by Morgan James Publishing and available through most channels where books are sold.

The “Goldilocks Approach To Grilling”

The single most asked question I get at supper clubs is: “Can you teach my husband to grill?”. Most of the time the complaint is that the steak is overcooked. The key to grilling the perfect piece of meat is the touch test, just like with Goldilocks.

The Goldilocks touch test

The meat can’t be too hard (Overdone)
The meat can’t be too soft (Underdone)
The meat has to be in-between (Just right – medium rare*)

Here is where my wife interjects: “What is easy for some is hard for others”. It is true that knowing what is perfect takes a little practice, but it can be taught. At Kraft Food Ingredients we had a promotion where Sales personnel had to go into customers facility and prepare a demonstration of grilled beef. To pull this off we did training on the touch test. We gave them three pieces of meat:

One that was cooked to well done. (It was as hard as a brick)
One that was cooked to rare (It was as soft as my stomach)
One that was cooked to a perfect medium rare (It was in-between well done and rare)

After that we had the Sales people do a little practice and the concept became clear. Granted these Sales people were smart folks. Many had degrees in food science. But, most were admittedly lousy cooks. Anyone can train themselves with a little practice.

When in doubt… cheat!

I have seen one of the best chefs I know cut a little slice to check the doneness of a piece of meat. There is nothing like being able to confirm the touch test with visible confirmation. I know that this breaks one of the golden rules of cooking in that when you cut a piece of meat you lose the juice. The way I look at it is, that if you have a guest that likes more well done than medium, they don’t like juicy anyway. You could serve them shoe leather and they will not know the difference (but I digress). By making a little slice you get confirmation and you also accelerate the cooking for the those that like more well done meat.

Rack of lamb has become my signature dish. The testimony behind it is that multiple times I have had guests tell me beforehand that they don’t like lamb. After trying my rack of lamb they become lamb lovers. The key to this dish is the perfect medium rare and the Goldilocks touch test with a little slice to check gets you there.

Check out the recipe.

For your next supper club dinner party (or any meal) try out the Goldilocks touch test and let me know…

If you enjoyed this blog and similar other stories/supper club lessons subscribe to get future blogs at www.impromptufridaynights.com/blog and check out my book Impromptu Friday Nights a Guide to Supper Clubs. Published by Morgan James Publishing and available through most channels where books are sold.

Notes: *I have asked chefs at fine ding restaurants what is the most asked for meat temperature. The consensus is that 85% of diners prefer medium rare