Cooking for guests - inspire me please

[MrsMattie]

We are having some friends over for dinner on Saturday night. They are staying over and will also be having lunch with us on Sunday.

I'd really like to do something impressive for dinner (and lunch, actually) - not a fiddly, 3 course meal type affair, but something fairly simple but with a bit of wow factor (they always cook really nice things when we go to their house). I just need a main course & dessert idea for dinner, and a main course idea for lunch.

Thanks!

Good main course is chicken breast stuffed with cream cheese and sun-dried tomato, wrapped in pancetta. Can be prepared in advance and only takes about 20 minutes to cook. My stock dinner party dessert is chocolate mousse. 2oz dark chocolate and one egg per person. Melt chocolate. Separate egg and stir egg yolk into melted chocolate. Whisk egg white and fold into chocolate. You can add brandy or Cointreau if you like. It makes a very heavy, dark mousse. If you prefer a lighter version, add some whipped double cream. The more cream, the lighter the mousse.

For sunday lunch i would be tempted to a roast of some description or a variation on that theme, some good ideas here:

www.bbcgoodfood.com/content/recipes/occasions/sunday-lunch/

Saturday night
Dessert i would second the choc mousse idea- always looks impressive esp if served with fanned strawberries

Main course- I do something similar to mummydoit which is chicken stuffed with sausagemeat, sun dreied tomato and basil. sounds wierd but never fails

or smoked salmon risotto with spinach, lemon, white wine, garnished with dill

Mmmm all good suggestions. How do you make the smoked salmon risotto?

Its dead easy!

fry onion in olive oil til soft but not coloured. add risotto rice (no idea on quantity, guess how much per person) and fry til opaque-ish approx 3-5 mins. add glass white wine (or more ) and fish stock.
let simmer whilst stirring and keep adding more stock and wine as the rice swells.

When the rice is about 5 mins from done, you can add some prawns if you want at this point.

Add some grated lemon zest now and the juice of a lemon

About 2mins from the end add the smoked salmon (any sooner i think ruins the flavour)

Voila!

I usually add some greenveg of some description- depends what it is as to when i add it, eg spinach is added very last minute, frozen peas or brocolli a bit sooner. mangetout is nice too.

Enjoy! Sorry the recipe is a bit haphazard, its off the top of my head

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/5965/smoked-salmon-and-lemon-risotto

thisis the real recipe which mine is based on

Something in pastry usually looks good, beef wellington, layered fish pie shaped to look like a fish, spanakopita. For dessert, icecream in brandy snap baskets (bought or home made), a roulade, gateau, cheescake.

I like things that can be prepared in advance and then just produced from oven or fridge/freezer! Rice can be pre-cooked, cooled quickly and put in pudding dishes/ramekins to turn out one per plate. Daupinoise pots are good to sit in oven for ages too.

Sunday lunch is always best to be a roast I think. Big joint of something, beef, loin of pork, leg lamb. If not perhaps a pre-prepared casserole?