FLANtastic!

I have to admit, the flowers from yesterday's post were for a reason...I had the flagship meeting of a few friends for our new Supper Club.  Here is how it works...The Hostess picks a cookbook, and makes the main course and everyone picks a dish from the book to make and bring.  I picked Alice Waters The Simple Art of Food.  Such a great cookbook... simple food is the best food. It was so much fun, and all of the Food was Delish.

Not being a real cookbook follower myself (I make things up as I go along, go figure:)) it was fun to go by a recipe...I made a few things I never had before...Pork Carnitas, Homemade Tortillas, and FLAN!  You would think the Flan would be where I failed, but it Turned out!!!!  It was amazing that this little flan made it thru, when they say take it out when jiggly, they mean jiggly!  I made the caramel, did the water bath, and thought I had failed big time when the water bath boiled over into the flan...but I just trudged on, thinking it would be a Huge mess when I turned it out onto the plate....I think I shreaked..."Oh, my gosh!" when all of the sauce fell out on top of the jiggly custard!  But, evidently that was how it was supposed to be.   Feeling so good about myself, I might try out for Next Food Network Star!

The Flan...just removed from the dish....didn't know that there would be so much sauce...THAT was a  surprise!

Mmmmm, mmmmm!

Here are some more stars of the evening....really it was ALL good, and I was more busy eating than taking photos.  I think I got most of it, except the beans and rice...which were excellent too and should have gotten a photo!

Sangria Anyone....this is great because it can be made by the glass instead of a huge vat!

Preparation of the Delicious Rice.

Yummy Guacamole....in my old vintage orange serving pieces.  I bring them out for mexican meals!

Is your mouth watering yet....Gazpacho....perfect in this heat!

A Nice big Carnita Burrito with ALL the fixins...and my attempt at Tortillas in the Background....
Made for better dippers than Burrito wraps.  Thank goodness I had a back up!

I love to set a table....going with the theme of simple and in-season, I picked the Black Eyed Susans as my centerpiece.  Determined to use what I had, and tired of my same old place mats,   I decided to use the cardboard seperators from the tons of paper samples that I have gotten, they were the perfect size....I KNEW they would come in handy some day.

I love a good Bird's Eye View

Burlap and Cardboard. and white china...Can you get any more simple??

My mother-in-law gifted me 5 vintage monogrammed Dinner Napkins with her maiden name initial "B".
I think that any monogram is pretty, even if it isn't your own.

Just another view.

So, I didn't get organized yesterday, but I managed to be a part of a Real Simple meal that was Simply Delicious!  AND to top it all off, I made FLAN....it was all just FLANtastic!  Ha, ha!  Can't wait for our next get together in September.