The Trial Run Dinner

We did a dinner trial run this past weekend and learned a lot from it.  We had 20 adults and lots of teens here to sample both pasta dishes and both salads, plus we torched the pasta and garlic bread to see how that will work on site.

The prettier pasta, a chicken, asparagus, italian sausage in a light cream sauce was less of a hit than the more traditional red sauce beef and italian sausage pasta.   Plus, I think the red one will be easier to make ahead of time as well.   We will make and freeze the pasta, the aromatic vegetables and ground beef+sausage, and the red/cream sauce.  At the site, we will heat this and add it to the chafer warming pan, then top with cheese, sliced tomatoes, sliced black olives, and green herbs like basil.  Then, we will torch the top of this to melt and brown the cheese.  It was beautiful in the trial run.  

The garlic bread...we are rethinking.  When we torched it, the bread picked up a very strong charred flavor, so we will either use toaster ovens that we bring with us or we will bring a commercial sized grill (friend who is torching can borrow it at no cost).   We will trial run both of these options though. Also, I'm not sure that the olive oil in the bread spread may have contributed to the taste issue, so I'll try the garlic/butter/olive oil mixture versus just plain butter/garlic.   

The salad - the antipasto salad won out over a simple spinach and bacon salad.   In addition, we learned that the homemade dressing was not what many wanted; instead they wanted a more creamy dressing that was applied in greater amounts.  So, we will serve 2 dressings in bottles on each table - eliminating the choice issue plus keeping the greens and croutons drier.   The croutons will go on last, just before serving.    We won't toss the salad either - we will layer the greens first, the antipasto ingredients next, and then top with croutons.  

The plain smoked sausage appetizers went like crazy, so we may do more of those and less of the meatball type, although we didn't trial run the meatballs to compare.   The sausage is the plain smoked sausage, about $2.50 for a 14oz link, that we smoke longer on our grill, then slice into 1/2" thick rounds, and spear with a toothpick.   Even without sauce or anything else, they went in 30 seconds.

Note - the sausages are 17c an ounce and the meatballs are 20-23c an ounce at Trader Joes (better reviews than Costco and the same price).