Dinner Diva’s: My Semi-Final Wedding Rehearsal Dinner Menu and Recipes …

So what is a day like on the set of Dinner Divas?  It’s looong and quite exhausting but at the end of it your adrenlin levels are just so high that you feel like you have consumed a hundred cups of coffee.   My mind was a bee-hive of buzzing and I was constantly running through my menu and the order in which I had to cook everything on my Bridal Rehearsal Dinner Menu.   After a 6am poly-filler session with the make-up girls, who were just so friendly and incredibly adept at making up an ‘older’ woman, we would make our way to the set which was just accross the road from The Upper East Side Hotel in Woodstock.

Peter Goff-Wood’s spot called Kitchen Cowboys was already a hive of activity at 7am and by the time that Nina, Kristy and I arrived the floor looked like a huge bowl of spaghetti had been tipped over!  Endless kilometers of electrical cords ensnared anything in its path.

At 8am breakfast was served, but I rarely had anything to eat, preferring to cook hungry!  Being that it was mid winter and freezing cold and I needed to warm up I did manage a cup of Chai tea.  At 09.00am we had just 30minutes to locate our ingredients, serving dishes, plates etc and gather up every pot, pan, cutting board, knife, sieve etc. that we would be using in the preparation of meals.  Once filming had begun, we were not allowed to leave our stations to get anything that we may have forgotten.  There would be a quick briefing by Anne Meyers, the executive producer of 2Blondes and a Redhead and we were off.

The Brief

The brief for this elimination round was to prepare a FESTIVE or SPECIAL OCCASION meal for 4-8 people.  It could be a dinner, breakfast, lunch or cocktail party … absolutel any occasion,  in 3 hours.

Judging Criteria

We were encouraged to keep in mind that this episode would be shown in summer and therefor were to keep this in mind.  The meal should be our “blog on a plate”, be for a family or our interpreatation of a family, show good taste, balance and nutrition, be seasonal, local produce, be well styled on the plate, based on a normal family budget.  We were asked to write a short post of 100 words describing the meal to the judges in our usual blog voice.  We had to write our recipes up for the judges scrutinise.

The Decision

My participation in Dinner Divas happened to coincide with my incredibly special and vry favourite nephew Claudio’s marriage to Jennifer, which was my motivation for the meal that I prepared.  A Tripepi wedding is such a joyous celebration of marriage and is accompanied by so many dinners and lunches drenched in hapiness for the various preparations for the joining of two families.  In this case, Jennifer and her family who are of French Mauritian decent fitted together with the Tripepi Clan like peas and carrots.  They are a wonderful family with just so much in common with us that from the moment that these two special people met, we have all been partying and celebrating together.  They love food and family just as much as we do ….. a perfect union in just so many ways.

I had to make a difficult decision, for partaking in Dinner Divas meant that I may just miss their wedding.  To make matters even more difficult, my son Daniele had been offered a job on set too.  After much deliberation and many considerations both Daniele and I agreed that the Universe was offering us a synergistic opportunity.  Daniele reminded me of the mantra that I had so often drummed into his head that, “It’s not the things that we DO in life that we regret, it’s the things that we DON’T DO”  and to never ever refuse opportunity for it will stop knocking at your door!  How our parental efforts at instilling wisdom do sometimes whip around and slap us in the face!  Daniele was tasked with the position of “Judge Liaison” and with the blessings of the other Divas, we both accepted this incredible rare opportunity to have an adventure together.

Claudio & Jennifer on their Wedding Day

My 100 words describing this meal.

Nothing gets la famiglia Tripepi more excited than a Tripepi wedding.  The hint of one starts a tsunami of wedding related celebrations.   New suits are the order of the day as uncles and cousins have either grown in height but mostly in girth and the ladies rush around ordering wedding regalia.  Bridesmaids and flower girls all in a row are paired with best friends and cousins and the mere mention of a pre-wedding gathering requires food and lots of it.

Aunties’ line up offering up their specialities for bridal showers and bachelor weekends and all this is wrapped up in massive bows of laughter.  The wedding rehearsal dinner is the last dinner before the big event and must be special as it serves to unite two families as one with the promise of a beautiful future and hopefully a few more Tripepi bambini.  This summer wedding, set on the sun kissed shores of KwaZulu Natal is a seafood celebration.  My wedding rehearsal dinner menu is light yet celebratory and will take these two families by the s and join them together on a seafood adventure.

Benvenuti nella famiglia Tripepi.

Of course I wasn’t able to photograph my recipes on set so you are not getting the usual step-by-step pictures that I would normally post.  I did, however feature three recipes that I had posted on my blog in the past.  This was my ‘old school’ way of doing exactly as I was told and truly representing ‘my blog’ on a plate.  I was raised at a time when we were taught to follow instructions to the letter and this is ONE of the lessons that I learnt in this competition.

Think outside the box Janice!

Just ONE of the valuable lessons that I learnt in this competition!

My Menu

Insalata di Frutti di Mare

(prawn and calamari cold seafood salad)

Calamari Ripieni

(Prawn and Mushroom Stuffed Squid in a tomato sauce served warm)

Dorado in Padella con Fettuccine fresce al sugo di Finocchi e Porri

(Pan Fried Dorado on a bed of fresh fettuccine with a Leek & Fennel Sauce)

Fragole al Cinzano con Zabaglione e Amaretti

Strawberries in Cinzano topped with Zabaglione, served with Amaretti.

 Please click here or on any of the photos of this menu to go to the recipes for these dishes.

This menu is certainly festive and in keeping with the celebration.  I chose a seafood feast to reflect the bounty of our coastline.  These are the pictures of the actual food that I cooked during the competition, so you can see exactly what the judges saw and tasted.

Seafood Salad

Serves 6 – 8 people

I had planned to serve a smaller portion than this in a cup and saucer but there wasn’t any on set.

Serves 6

I served just one squid per portion as there was plenty more to come.

This is one of those dishes that actually improves with age.  Make it the day before your function or meal, not only will the flavours have improved but you will have extra time to prepare the other components of your meal and be a cool, calm and collected Zen Hostess!

Dorado in Padella con Fettuccine fresce al sugo di Finocchi e Porri

And there you have it ….. my semi-final meal.  Unfortunately, we didn’t ever get any direct feedback from the Judges so I can’t really tell you where I did well or where I failed in this meal.  We shall have to wait for tomorrow’s screening to find out!

See you there!

SABC2 at 08.30am in the Dinner Divas Kitchen!

As always

Buon Appetito

xxx

jan