I'm not a vegetarian but I don't eat a lot of meat for health reasons, and so many of my friends are vegetarian that I've developed an extensive repertoire of tasty vegetarian dishes that I really like and often serve at dinner parties. This year, I invited three friends over for lunch yesterday. One of the three is vegetarian, and I decided that I would make the entire meal meatless, rather than cooking two separate meals.
I did toy with the idea of making a turkey breast for the three meat eaters, but even a breast alone yields a LOT of meat, and I knew from experience that I would have way too many leftovers. Years ago, I cooked a turkey breast for three adults and one child and had so many leftovers that I barely had room in my freezer for all of them. Also, I'm not all that excited about turkey. It's fine but I would honestly prefer a Cornish hen or a duck breast.
I set out quite a few appetizers, including nuts, cheese, clementines, olives, and deviled eggs. I really like deviled eggs and make them any chance I get.
The main course was mushrooms bourguignon over egg noodles, served with sour cream and chives. I also made a very hearty kale salad. Both of those recipes and the one for the deviled eggs came from the first Smitten Kitchen cookbook (I'm putting her recently released second book on my Christmas wish list because I love the first one so much).
One of my friends brought dinner rolls, and another brought two pies from Bakers Square, so we had quite the feast. And I didn't miss the turkey at all.
I did toy with the idea of making a turkey breast for the three meat eaters, but even a breast alone yields a LOT of meat, and I knew from experience that I would have way too many leftovers. Years ago, I cooked a turkey breast for three adults and one child and had so many leftovers that I barely had room in my freezer for all of them. Also, I'm not all that excited about turkey. It's fine but I would honestly prefer a Cornish hen or a duck breast.
I set out quite a few appetizers, including nuts, cheese, clementines, olives, and deviled eggs. I really like deviled eggs and make them any chance I get.
The main course was mushrooms bourguignon over egg noodles, served with sour cream and chives. I also made a very hearty kale salad. Both of those recipes and the one for the deviled eggs came from the first Smitten Kitchen cookbook (I'm putting her recently released second book on my Christmas wish list because I love the first one so much).
One of my friends brought dinner rolls, and another brought two pies from Bakers Square, so we had quite the feast. And I didn't miss the turkey at all.
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