Dinner parties can be overwhelming to host, so chefs and cookbook authors give Sophie Morris their insider tips
All the gear, no idea? Lots of us like to think we know plenty about food, but when it comes to feeding foodie friends, hosting can be a fraught process. Is there a way to fake a great dinner? Can you fool a food snob with minimum effort? We asked chefs and authors for their insider tips and cooking shortcuts your foodloving friends won’t notice.
1. CHOOSE A ROTISSERIE CHICKEN OVER ROASTING YOUR OWN
The No-Cook Cookbook (Quadrille, £22) is the ultimate guide for hosts who want to dial down the prep without downsizing the applause. Food stylist and author Susie Theodorou has heaps of ideas for delivering cook-free and fuss-free dinners to a discerning audience, and a stand out concept is buying in a rotisserie chicken, learning to carve it like a pro, then following one of her recipes for transforming it into the best roast chicken your friends have ever eaten, from a chicken tostada night or family taco platter to salsa verde chicken salad.
“So many of us have become food enthusiasts with a solid interest in and knowledge of great food,” she says. “We’re no longer willing to settle for meals that aren’t varied, delicious and beautiful. And yet, we don’t always have the time to cook what we’d like to eat or serve to our loved ones.
“I wanted to show how easy meals can be assembled quickly and meet our culinary standards.”
2. SHARE YOUR HOLIDAY CUISINE
The MasterChef winner Tim Anderson recommends showing off some holiday food finds to impress friends and his new book Hokkaido (out on Thursday, Quadrille, £28) is a product of his own travels and the first book to celebrate the cuisine of this Japanese island.
“Save a special food souvenir to share,” he says. “This could be a really beautiful tin of top-quality fish from Spain or Portugal, some great cheese from France, or if you are so lucky, some beautiful sweets from Japan. They will be excited to try something that’s not easy to get, and they’ll feel like one of the privileged few who gets to try it - but serving it will take almost zero effort on your part.”
3. BUY PRE-MIXED COCKTAILS
Chef Romy Gill, the author of Romy Gill’s India (Hardie Grant, £28), recommends saving time on the drinks front. “Lots of friends love cocktails. I always buy a quality mixer - a pre-made liquid blend used as a base for cocktails, to mix with alcohol or serve with non-alcoholic drinks.
“Make it more interesting by adding fresh herbs, citrus slices, fruits or a splash of champagne. The drinks will look and taste delicious with minimal effort.”
4. CHEAT’S LASAGNE
The freezer section isn’t the only shortcut to a great lasagne. Jacob Kenedy, the chef/owner of Bocca Di Lupo and Gelupo, has a sneaky hack that will taste just as good with far less effort.
“Pappardelle, undercooked and tossed in ragu, in two layers with bechamel and Parmesan in between and on top, is almost indistinguishable from lasagne and can be thrown together in a quarter of the time,” he says.
5. REINTERPRET YOUR REGULAR PASTA
Another great pasta hack is to use your supermarket pasta in new ways. Ben Waugh, executive chef at Bancone, suggests taking fresh lasagne sheets and cutting them down from rectangle into squares, cooked to create gorgeous fazzoletti. “We would serve our signature confit egg yolk on fazzoletti,” explains Waugh. “But the home cook could easily add a crispy fried egg, salt, olive oil and a sprinkling of Parmesan. Winner!”
6. PROFESSIONAL BURGERS FROM YOUR HOME KITCHEN
Burger expert Anthony Murphy, author of The Beefy Boys (Quadrille, £20), has a few smart tips to take your burgers up a notch. First of all: the meat. “No breadcrumbs!” he says. “That’s for meatloaf. Restaurant quality burgers are 100 per cent meat.”
You don’t even need a binder like egg, just good-quality mince - best if minced fresh that day - and don’t season it before cooking, only once it’s on the grill. What else?
“Toast your bun in bacon fat,” says Murphy. And his ultimate pro tip: “Steam your burgers! Put the cheese on and the bun lid on, hit the hot plate with some water, and cover with a pan. Give that burger a steamy sauna!”
7. BUY FRESH STOCK
Everyone loves a decent gravy with their roast dinner. Elliott Grover, executive chef at the hotel 45 Park Lane, can’t do things by halves at work. But at home, he says, you can fool foodie friends by keeping things simple and buying in a goodquality fresh stock. This will save you hours, and it’s possible that a professionally made fresh stock will taste better than your own.
8. PASTA PESTO
Who is brave enough to serve up pasta pesto to judgemental friends? It feels a bit like turning up to work naked. But Kenedy says you can get away with it by making proper homemade pesto. “A big batch of pesto Genovese, frozen in little parcels, brings the taste of fresh ingredients and careful sourcing when you need a great meal at no notice,” he insists.
9. GET GOOD AT GARNISHES
“Keep it simple and seasonal, but micro herbs are always an easy way to add a hint of green to a dish,” says Millie Simpson, the kitchen manager at The Langham cookery school. “Make sure they work with the flavours of the dish. I like to choose a seasonal salad leaf such as tardivo, frisée or endive.”
10. CHEAT WITH CANNED GOODS
Authentic curries require lots of time and attention, but even Vivek Singh, one of the UK’s most prominent Indian chefs, takes a shortcut now and then.” I use tinned tomatoes for a butter chicken recipe instead of boiling my own purée,” says the and founder of The Cinnamon Collection restaurants. “I’m always surprised how a pinch of sugar, a splash of water and a handheld stick blender manage to save me 45 minutes.”