Chef Debbie Says: I Love Birthdays When They're Not Mine!

Last Saturday was sweet husband Tim's birthday. Number 54 (in case you were wondering).

In Yummy! world, a birthday means a party. And a party means friends. And drinks. And food.

Lots and lots and lots of food. (Well, actually lots and lots of drinks too, but you knew that already didn't you?)

After several days in the kitchen, here's what the masses nibbled on:

Beef tenderloin, rubbed with bourbon barrel smoked sea salt, roasted rare and sliced paper thin

Marinated jumbo shrimp with homemade cocktail sauce

Honey Dijon marinated pork tenderloin, sliced paper thin and served with spicy mango and papaya salsa

Salmon 3~ways with Yummy~ized blinis: salmon roasted with maple and dill; roasted with Dijon and sesame; and, sweet and spicy. Blinis were served on toasted sourdough, topped with dilled deviled egg salad, creme fraiche and Tobiko caviar

An entire tray of 50 blinis ~ which were gone in about 15 seconds...

Sesame chicken with sweet garlic chili dipping sauce

Truffle paté and black peppercorn paté

Creamy caviar dip

New Orleans spicy crab dip

Tim's favorite spicy deviled eggs with crab ~ 48 whole eggs were gone almost before I could put the platter down

Brie with balsamic caramelized onion chutney and spicy pecans

Cheese, cheese and more cheese

Parmesan cubes with 2 dipping sauces: black truffle honey and red chili apricots

Chunky Danish bleu dip

Roasted 3~onion dip

And desserts. And fruit. And chocolate truffles. And sweet and crunchy pecans...

Judging from the amount of food left over ~ which was a crumb here and there ~ I'm thinking none of the guests had seen a scrap of food since about Tuesday...

If I'd followed a traditional caterer's calculations of:
# of Hours x # of People = Total # of Bites
I would have been about 20 pounds short just on the protein!

So even though it's a lot of work, I thank Bacchus that sweet husband is in good health, that we have amazing and wonderful friends and that I had Sunday off to clean up!