At some point we have all indulged in an episode of “Come Dine With Me”, and now I give you the Londonfoodgal version, minus the film crew, no cash prize, but there is a pretty little plastic trophy up for grabs for the winning couple.

The six of us have been hosting “Come Dine With Me” evenings for the last 2 years. There have been lots of laughs, yummy themes, bad entertainment attempts, and some becoming drunker than others (mostly me).

This time around though it was my turn to host. Feeling overly confident, I foolishly announced I would be going all fine dining on them. Fillet Steak, pureed mash, red wine sauce, carrot puree, gold cheesecake, and a milk foam, WHAT!!!

I hadn’t really considered the extent of the menu, until I started searching for recipes and creating the shopping list. If you are ever in need of some inspiration, Great British Chefs is a fabulous place to start! Luckily for you, I have done all the hard work on this one, so if you fancy giving this a go at home you can download the shopping list HERE!

So let’s get started…………………………

The Prep!

Step 1 – Get the cheesecake made and pop it in the fridge, I used this amazing recipe – Toblerone Cheesecake (Milk Chocolate)

Step 2 – Get the Shallot & Red wine sauce cooking. I used Gordon Ramsay’s recipe!

Step 3 – Peel the potatoes for your Ultimate mashed potato, I followed this by Heston Blumenthal 

 

Step 4 – Make the carrot puree, just follow steps 1 & 2 HERE

Step 5 – Slice the baby carrots and shallots and put in to a roasting dish, sprinkle with salt and pepper with a dash of olive oil, oven roast these for 10-15mins prior to serving time.

Step 6 – I’ll admit the soup was a bit of a cheat, I used shop bought soup, BUT of course you can make your own if you have the time. I added a milk foam and cheesy croutons, following steps 1,2,3 & 8 HERE 

Step 7 – Set the table!

On paper everything looks pretty easy, and to be fair the soup was!! Heat it up and create some foam using warmed milk, throw in the cheesy sour dough croutons and boom, you’re done.

Dishing up the main course, a different story altogether, you need to make sure you have the timings down.

First to the plate was the puree,  it would seem I wasn’t quite prepared enough. I bought plastic piping bags which could not withstand the heat of a boiling hot puree. It resulted in a lot of screaming, scolded hands and the use of the trusty old marigold, to get me through my poor piping skills.

With purees on plates, I turned my attention to the showpiece, fillet steak, no pressure. I always use these timings when cooking steak –

• Blue: About 1½ mins each side
• Rare: About 2¼ mins each side
• Medium-rare: About 3¼ mins each side
• Medium: About 4½ mins each side

Cooking 6 was interesting to say the least, adding each one at a time dependent on how they wanted it cooked, timers going off left, right and centre, fat splashing out of the hot pan, I was in a right mess!

Whilst the steak is cooking place the roasted veg around the plate and pour the sauce into a jug.

Finally making it to the table despite looking like a total car crash, it appeared to be getting decent scores all round!

Dessert, and time to redeem myself for that time I served an awful tiramisu, now known as tirami-poo. Yes, it really was that awful!

Take the cheesecake chilled from the fridge, remove from the tin, heat the sharp knife and get to slicing. Dust in gold edible spray and finish with some kind of edible flower, the choice is yours. I must say I was pretty pleased with this and everyone else seemed happy about it too, even diving in for 2nds!

 

Once the hard part is over you can fill the rest of the evening with games and wine, these nights have become our new going out!

 

And so now it is over to you, give it a go and let me know how you get on by leaving a comment below……

See you on the next one!