Dinner Party. 12

Last night we had one of the smaller dinner parties that Little Gidding has yet seen--it was only Stearns, Lawrence, Lawrence's friend and me. Still, we managed to be within the extreme upper and lower limits of dinner parties (attributed to Varro)--no fewer than the Graces (3) and no more than the Muses (9). We ate a family staple from our childhood--chicken and rice (it had never occurred to me before how un-creatively named that is), with homemade garlic bread (Stearns') and salad, and Stearns' widely acclaimed pumpkin roll for dessert.



In my tradition of amusing mistakes (such as serving eggplant parmesan and chicken parmesan at the same dinner), my first attempt at a cheese plate (it can't really be called that, since there were only two cheeses) was entirely comprised of two soft cheese--brie and goat cheese. And if I've learned one thing from Hopkins' blog, it's that you should vary flavor and texture (on the plus side, there were cashews in addition to two types of crackers).