Eggy Cooking Club

Emily hosted the April Cooking Club tonight, and the theme was eggs. A perfect theme for springtime, especially since the dinner took place on Easter Weekend! I decided to make a strata, which I had never done before. I made a dinner strata that had mushrooms, onion, spinach, ricotta and marinara. Here it is fresh out of the oven!



Valerie made challah bread! Look at how shiny and delicious.



Of course there was Easter candy.



Nancy was in charge of cocktails! The first one was a Perfect Lady, which has gin, peach brandy, lemon juice and egg whites. Cheers!



Summer made some little egg sandwich appetizers! They were on little toasts with a basil-arugula pesto. MMM!! Amazing.



Emily made a salmon souffle! Look at how tall and mighty it is!!



Yumi made a side dish of asparagus with bearnaise sauce.



Oh, hi! This challah was OUTSTANDING and the best thing about it was that Valerie made tons of it so that we could all take it home to make french toast the next day. I've heard the legend of how challah bread makes the most incredible french toast in the world, but I have never experienced it yet. Can't wait!



Emily bought some fancy eggs from the farmer's market. They were $1 apiece! This is because they come from a rare breed of chicken. She hardboiled them and we each ate one half just to see how they taste. It was delicious, but it tasted mostly like a REGULAR delicious hardboiled egg to me!



Here I am cutting into my strata. Rarr, look at the size of that knife! I am SERIOUS about cutting this thing up.



At this point, it was time for Nancy to prepare her second cocktail of the evening. This one was called a Royal Rumble, and included gin, one beer, orange soda, and a whole egg. Sunset Wheat was the beer of choice.



Here is Nancy, ready to add the egg!



Money shot!



OOPS!!! The blender was too full and Royal Rumble went EVERYWHERE!!! I love the look on Nancy's face as she's realizing that this is happening.



We cleaned up the explosion, and got back to it. This time the look on her face says, "Oh yeah. I am in charge here. I OWN you, blender. Just TRY to explode again, I dare you!!!!"



This time it was a success! ROYAL RUMBLE!



This is where I would like to make an announcement that I'm afraid my camera is dying. All of a sudden, the little lens won't immediately open when I turn it on, and look at THIS picture!!:



WTF?!

For dessert, Emily made sabayon with fresh fruit. It was soooooooo good!!!!



Seriously, SO good.



SERIOUSLY.



At this point I started to get passionate about something (yogurt? I think?) and realized I forgot to pack my ushanka! I really like to always have it with me at Cooking Club because you just never know. Luckily, Emily also owns a fur hat!! Whew! A passionate tirade just isn't the same without one.



You can really tell I mean it when the fist hits the table.



Doesn't Emily look lovely in it?



The last cocktail of the night, which not everyone chose to enjoy, started with this bowl of glittering Peeps.



Peeps + wine! Obviously the yellow Peeps go with white wine.



And the pink ones go with red! CHEERS!