That sounds delicious and what fun to share this meal with neighbours.

Kswl, your sauce and roast are delicious looking. I’ll need your GPS coordinates.

Well, I just invited myself as a mystery guest.

It looks and sounds wonderful!

Sounds divine! can you share the soup recipe? Thanks.

I love your GWCD plans! Enjoy. My (lunch) company just left so time to check in on y'all.

I don't even need a place at the table and can eat at the counter in the kitchen. Yum!

Looks and sound delicious! Since you don't know who's coming, I guess a few more of us would fit right in?

I've never sieved a sauce. Is it to get tiny lumps out? Other items? I've never made a sauce that a whisk doesn't beat into submission.

ETA: Clearly I didn’t read the OP very well. i’m not a very refined person so I’d have left it rustic.

Sounds like a wonderful dinner. I rarely make a sauce and if I had to sieve it I surely wouldn't.

The roasts look delicious! I would probably not sieve a sauce and would deceive my guests by telling them that it is supposed to be "rustic".

My home cooking does’t usually run to sauces that need to be sieved but cooking in the work kitchen certainly did.

i cooked for just one friend this evening. she thinks a cheese soufffle is a big deal so i pulled out the copper bowl and giant whisk to beat the whites by hand. A souffle coming out of the oven is a beautiful thing.

It’s nice to both be sensitive to the details of the foods you make and to enjoy the process.

You are going to have to come back and let us know what the mystery guests brought! What an interesting concept!

I rarely sieve sauces. I think the last time I did, it was a raspberry coulis. One of my guests was just coming off a bout of diverticulitis and I didn’t want to serve anything that might cause a flare up. I cooked a chuck roast sous vide for 30 hours last week. The cooking bag was full of delicious juice. I strained it through cheesecloth before freezing.

Yes, we want a post-game recap KSWL!

Everything looks amazing-- you can just see how flavorful it will be!

I don't usually sieve gravy or sauces but I think you did the right thing-- it looks so velvety smooth and I don't think I'd like the mustard seed floating in it.

Love the idea for a dinner party-- enjoy!

WOW! YOU ROCK! That looks A M A Z I N G ! Perfection! 💕

Lisa, cheese soufflé is one of my favorite dishes. It's easy and usually I have everything on hand. I like to add spinach to mine. It's deceptively easy. All you need is a whisk and something to beat egg whites.

Firstly, thank you for the encouragement! I had a good laugh over some of the sieving comments— believe me, I’m not normally a siever! But I believe it is safe to say that the sauce was the star of the evening, everyone raved about it and it was in fact, delicious, as was the roast.

But enough about me— here’s the report on other dishes brought. Let me preface this by saying that aside from a food and cooking interest group in our community, most people seem pretty uninterested in food generally and are indifferent cooks at best. Potlucks have a definite emphasis on luck, and many people buy things to bring. That said, our guests brought an appetizer, a salad, and a side dish. The appetizer was a cheese and cracker tray. It was was varied and nicely presented and we enjoyed it on the screened porch. The salad was all romaine with carrots, radishes and tomatoes. It was dressed right before dinner with a creamy Italian dressing made by the person who brought it, light and good. The side dish was a hash brown casserole. This appeared to be made of frozen hash brown potatoes cooked with sour cream and cheese, topped with crushed ruffles potato chips. I did try it. Because it was brought in an insulated casserole carrier it was still very hot, which was its main appeal. I was very glad to have made the soup as a first course, and it was delicious and of course served in those adorable seasonal covered soup bowls.

Dessert at my neighbor’s was not a great experience. We all walked there after dinner and entering the house was like walking into a sauna. The temperature was at least 80 and everyone was visibly uncomfortable. The hostess had moved out all her living room furniture and put up folding tables for people to sit and eat dessert. I had thought others would be contributing to the desserts but the hostess had made them both— two cobblers that came out of the oven as we arrived (more heat in addition to the heating system that was on.) She served peach and apple cobbler with vanilla ice cream which had to be eaten sitting down and right away, hence the tables. But because each person had to be individually served not more than a few people were eating together at a time. It sort of had the feel of rotating cafeteria shifts. A variety of small individual desserts plus a fresh fruit choice probably would have been a better set up, obviating the need for tables and providing more variety as well as a choice for people watching their weight or sugar intake. (I thought that was especially odd because her own husband is an insulin dependent diabetic.) Anyway, she clearly went to a lot of trouble and made a massive effort, just isn’t an experienced hostess.

It was fun to see everyone and two of our guests had just returned from a trip to Ireland and had many great stories to share. I got to know our guests much better in a more intimate setting than our usual streetwide gatherings. So, a definite success, if not culinary, at least socially.

Maggie, i dont have a recipe per se for the chicken soup, but the ingredients are
white meat chicken cooked in a dutch oven with a lot of fresh herbs, then deboned and skin removed and cut in chunk , jasmine rice, wild rice, celery, shiitake mushrooms, portobello mushrooms, sweet onions, cream, chicken stock, and and thyme. No binders (no roux or cornstarch or pureed veg), so although it is a cream soup the broth is thin.

Kswl, it is interesting to hear that people who are not dedicated cooks participated.

Your hash brown casserole reminds me of a dinner DH and I were invited to. I was surprised to be invited because I know the hostess prides herself on never cooking. Dinner was Marie Callender chicken pot pies, still in their little paper pans. I think there may have been a bag salad to complement them. And she cared not one whit that she hadn’t slaved in the kitchen all day. I sometimes wish I had that much self-possession.

Bbstx, it was really just a social event to facilitate small groups and not really a Dinner, capital D, iykwim. I think the other hosts made casseroles as their main dish. And this was just our own street of 25 homes, we are the smallest POD (phase of development) in the community so we all already know each other fairly well. I think the people who came here were surprised at our (very relative) level of formality; none had actually been here before. We’ve had some neighbors for dinner but just the ones we knew before we moved here. And during the pandemic and after DH’s cancer we were not inviting too many unrelated people. Our summer was taken up with DD and fam move, i was decorating their house and we did not entertain much except family.

I forgot to post a picture of the set table. Not all the napkins are in place, nor the steak knives, but this is it mostly finished. I ended up loving the variation of the soup bowls, surprisingly. All these colors look great with Friendly Village, which I would use for salad plates had we needed them (and will for Thanksgiving). I especially love the little velvet acorns with real acorn caps. They’re top heavy and have to be clustered or nestled against something to keep from from toppling over, but I thought they were darling.

I used the vintage Gorham pewter flatware I bought for Thanksgiving five or six years ago, pewter water goblets (all lead free of course) and Arte Italica pewter stemmed wine glasses. The tiny lights battery pack was concealed in the flowers. I used a glass vase inside my pewter ice bucket for the flowers. You can’t tell from the photo but the middle guests were staggered slightly so they could see around the flowers. I know eye level flowers are not the thing but I do like a taller arrangement when I can position people around it. I also used a tall thin glass liner inside this vase, which is my favorite, in the sitting room across the entry for a nice casual bunch of autumn- colored blooms:

Beautiful! Wow, love it all!

Just lovely all of it !!!

So do I, Lisa! For one thing it is just so much more comfortable, and I also like moving people around the house so the conversation groups change. In our old house we used to have coffee and dessert in the library. Here I do appetizers on the screened porch or living room then move to the dining room. I have a friend who serves small mugs of soup outside on trays as people are milling about before dinner. It’s a quick something between an app and a first course. I am going to try that the next time we have people for dinner.

This post might do better on Cooking or Entertaining forums.

How do you define "do better"?

Elizabeth, It's a conversation, isn't it?

This lil' board is not really topic specific. Instead, it is specific to people who try to be polite, pleasant and helpful, and I think that is what most of us like about it!

I agree with KSWL and Lisa. We far prefer to dine at home. I enjoy planning, cooking and tablescapes. I also like a leisurely meal that starts with nibbles and drinks outside or in the LR, and serving dessert after dinner and after a stroll, a game, some sort of break. When we have guests over for a meal, they might stay 5 hours. Eating out, more like 1.5... maybe 2.

Great table, KSWL! Sounds like a fun evening. I am sure you were, in every way, "the belle of the ball."

I know a couple who only entertains in restaurants. I’m closer to the husband than the wife, so I don’t know what dynamic drives it. Maybe she is a lousy cook. Or maybe she just doesn’t want to be bothered.

On a couple of occasions when I wanted to entertain but just had too much on my plate to add anything else, I’ve had a private chef come into my house to cook and serve the meal. I find that preferable to going out to a restaurant.

BBstx, I was thinking gee, never done that, but then i remembered we had a private chef for about 6 years, until she retired. She worked Mon-Thurs but occasionally we'd ask her to cook for a dinner party. That is the perfect solution! I am not even sure who i'd ask to do that now.

The food sounds delicious and your table setting is beautiful!

My heart hurts a little for the guest who made the hashbrown casserole. Sounds like something I would make. But then again, I am not a great cook...

To answer your question, the only food I have ever sieved was raspberries, I think. Surely, I've sieved more, but I, too, tend to prefer the texture of what's in a sauce. At most, I'll use an immersion blender if a sauce needs smoothing.

Your dishes sound wonderful, and what an interesting evening. Your table is beautiful! Love, love, love the pewter and the twinkle of the lights. The "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" theme is fun, and certainly brought some surprises. I think it's great you could focus on the company, rather than the food. After your menu, the other dishes seem a giant letdown.

In our old neighborhood, there were a few families who regularly got together for meals. I and another would take turns hosting. One of the neighborhood couples who were consistently invited (but rarely offered to host) always showed up with a platter of cheese and sausage, and a box of crackers. Every. Single. Time. We learned it was put together last-minute by the husband, who was the cook for his family but didn't know how to entertain other than to point you to the cooler of beer when you showed up at his door. The wife had no interest in cooking or entertaining. It just wasn't their thing.

Perhaps I should have used the phrase" better categorized" as such and such. I must be mistaken thinking this forum remained on topic.

shopping101, my heart hurts a little for her, too. We like hashbrown casserole, but we only have it a few times a year at family dinners. It's not the cheapest dish to make and takes some work to make it, which makes me feel bad for the guest who brought it. I hope someone liked it.

Kswl, it sounds like you certainly did your part to make the dinner a success. Sorry about the disappointments.

Well I give credit to people who step outside their comfort zone and entertain because they just like having people around. when you have a potluck uncertainty is the name of the game. This was the first GWCD since we moved here so I did not really know what to expect. If we host again I will be prepared with at least an additional veg but won’t bring it out unless it’s obvious we need it.

Our ladies’ holiday event is at my house this year and I’ve decided not to have everyone bring something. There are a couple of people I may ask to bring dishes but it won’t be potluck. I’m thinking about A Nutcracker Brunch. Will be posting soon for ideas!

adding, shopping 101 you are not alone if you like hash brown casserole! One of the other guests commented that she makes it the same way, with potato chips instead of cracker crumbs. I believed these to be staples of breakfast buffets and brunch potlucks; I’ve not seen it served for dinner so at least part of my reaction was surprise.

FWIW, as long as the comment doesn't violate Ho-uzz rules, nothing in this forum is off-topic. It was originally set up for people who interacted in Garden Web Home Decorating to talk about things other than home decorating. No guidelines, no restrictions.

Whew! My fox paw.

Actually, Elizabeth, I apologize. I actually thought this was just called "Conversations." I forgot. Dee is right about the history, but I can understand that you might think it is for convos about Home Decorating & Design.