My View: Wings and a prayer – chicken saves dinner party - Buffalo News
There are those who rejoice in hosting a dinner party. They love the planning of it, the actual act of creating it, and finally, the joy of presenting it to their guests. How I envy them, since I belong to the group who quakes in fear at all the above. In spite of that, there comes a time when one must do what one must do.
Marge McMillen, of East Amherst, finds hosting a dinner party to be stressful.
I am lucky that I have retained some friends from my high school years, and that is quite remarkable when you consider that I am now in my 80s. Our group consisted of three couples from the good old days and one that we adopted along the way, making for a total of eight people.
Each couple would take their turn hosting, at which time they would first present a cocktail hour (or more) consisting of drinks and snacks, then a full dinner, followed by a fun game of cards. I’ll never forget, nor will my friends, one that I hosted some years ago.
The planning and shopping was done. I was to have Swiss steak, baked potatoes, green beans, salad, rolls and pie for dessert. Swiss steak is a mess to make, since the flour and spices must be pounded into the steak for tenderizing, followed by quickly searing the meat in hot grease for browning. Luckily, this is something that can be done long before guests arrive, so I, being the diligent planner, had those preps all done when my doorbell rang, announcing my first guests.
After all arrived, we enjoyed our cocktails and snacks, accompanied with our usual fits of laughter. And then it was time for me to present the dinner. I left the group to serve the salad and discovered to my amazement that I hadn’t even made it. What? No salad? How embarrassing.
Could I quickly assemble one? Of course, except that I had none of the ingredients with which to make it. It seems my refrigerator crisper was as empty as my mind.
I timidly approached my guests and confessed my sin, with multiple apologies. Luckily, they were dear friends, and they pooh-poohed my regrets, all solemnly averring they would not miss having a salad with their dinner.
I breathed a sigh of relief and sent up a quick prayer of thanks for having such good friends. Well now, nothing more to do but to present the entrée. I opened my oven door and saw 10 large potatoes baking on the rack. Where was the meat? Mystery solved: still in the refrigerator. Meat that takes an hour and a half to cook was still in the refrigerator. Somebody, quick, call 911.
Suddenly the missing salad paled in comparison. Can you imagine what it was like to have to admit to your guests that you had nothing for dinner except baked potatoes and green beans? I was almost in tears, when my husband (my hero) said not to worry. He would go to the store and get a couple of rotisserie chickens.
He did just that, and to this day, one of my friends tells me how happy she was that I had forgotten to put the meat in the oven since she had never had one of those chickens, and was now a devoted fan of them.
Time marches on, and sadly our group of eight has now been reduced to five. But that doesn’t stop those of us remaining from getting together every few months for the same cocktail hour, dinner and cards, with nary a missing entrée or salad.
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