make-in-advance dinner party recipes, please?

[SpanishFly]

Now, when I say "dinner party" I really mean friends coming for a bite to eat - doesnt need to be formal or fancy. But preparing in advance is desirable so I'm not in the kitchen for an hour... We love things like Spanish or Mediterranean style dishes, ie chicken/olives/chorizo/rice kind of thing, Mexican and curries. I'd particularly like lowish fat recipes or one-pot recipes - but that's not essential!

Thanks! !

do you have a slow cooker?

LURK

I'd recommend Delia's roasted veg with harissa dressing www.deliaonline.com/recipes/roasted-vegetable-couscous-salad-with-harissa-style-dressing.html

Can all be prepped in advance and then just shoved in the oven. I am always recommending this on mumsnet, sadly I'm not on commission! I've served with sliced salamis, cheese and extra bread when I was worried there wasn't enough one time (there was).

No, dont have a slow cooker

Thanks, I'll have a look at the Delia recipe now!

The Claudia Roden Venetian Tagliatelli with Chicken is very good

Here's a version of it. I make it with just the pinenuts and rosemary (rather than with raisins which are in the original recipe). You can roast the chicken in advance (or buy a ready roasted one) and also make the sauce (the drippings/liquid from the roast chicken heated with chopped rosemary and pinenuts) and then on the day you just cook the pasta, and stir the shredded chicken and sauce through. I've even done it pre-cooking the pasta - tagliatelli doesn't work, but short pastas (e.g. penne, fusilli) do, as long as you coat the pasta in olive oil (to stop it from sticking together) before refrigerating.

This Ottolenghi recipe can also be prepared in advance (just heat up the chicken in the oven before serving). I tend to do it with pinenuts instead of hazelnuts.

I've done this before, very tasty & easy, you can use thighs for it as well, chickenjambalaya

Oooh we've got friends for dinner this Saturday, they might get something more adventurous than lasagne at this rate!

Chicken basque. Chicken, rice, tomatoes, olives, peppers and chorizo all cooked in one pot. Delia has a good recipe.

I love lasagne though! That and moussaka can be made in advance and kept in the fridge until you're ready to cook.

Ooh ive done chicken basque before - it's amazing! Jambalaya might be good - quite similar, I think. Or moussaka - mmmmmmmm!

Buy a raclette - lidl do cheap ones.

Supply salad, veg, meat, cheese, egg and have fun

Beef bourguignon is always a winner here. It's a dish that actually improves for being made the day before!

I'd love a raclette - although this weekend's friend has a real issue with cheese. I dont want to hospitalise her, so i'll avoid that for now. But I'll be looking for a grill very soon

sashh do they still sell the raclette in Lidl, or was it a while ago you saw it? In our local shop they only stock these sorts of things on a week-by-week basis

I went for jambalaya, and it was delicious. I did the Hairy Bikers one. Would highly recommend it