Becky's Baby Shower

I actually wrote this last night but didn't post it until now so I could get the remaining recipes on here.

Today we had my sister's baby shower, Becky is due on Christmas Eve and is expecting a baby boy! A couple of months ago when my mom first started planning the shower I told her I would make all of the food rather than hiring a caterer.  This all seemed like a great idea until a few weeks ago when I found out I needed to be in Los Angeles for work Tuesday through Thursday of this week.  When I first told my mom that I was going to be out of town her face was priceless, but everything worked out great.  I was off yesterday so we did most of the cooking then and I had a lot of help from my mom, sisters and my brother's fiancée.

One of the most important things we tried to do was make as much as we could ahead of time.  The shower began at noon so we didn't have a whole lot of extra time in the morning to prepare things.

Menu
Appetizers
Assorted Fine Cheeses, Nuts and Crackers
Marinated Olives
Pumpkin stuffed with Garlic Herb Cheese Dip

Main Course
Asian Pear and Spring Green Salad
Roasted Beet and Arugula Salad with Orange Vinaigrette
Pickled Shrimp with Lemon Chive Aioli
Rustic Tomato & Mozzarella Tart
Goat Cheese, Leek and Mushroom Tart
Beef Tenderloin Sandwiches with Caramelized Onions

Dessert
Apple Cake
Pumpkin Bars
Sweet Mandie B's Mini Cupcakes

Beverages
Bloody Marys
Pomegranate Mimosas
Red and White Wine
Grapefruit Izze drinks for the pregnant lady

The mom-to-be





View of the Cheese Tray

The cheeses included: Manchego, Goat Gouda, 8 year Cheddar and 12 month Mimolette
Marcona Almonds, Honey Roasted Almonds, Dried Cranberries, Red Grapes
Brie with Cranberries
Pumpkin Stuffed with Garlic Herb Cheese Dip


Another view of the appetizers












Marinated Olives
I purchased a container of pitted kalamata olives and green olives stuffed with garlic cloves.  Combine both types of olives in a bowl and drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with chopped fresh parsley, cracked ground pepper and a dash of red pepper flakes.

Pumpkin Stuffed with Garlic Herb Cheese Dip
Clean out the inside of a pie pumpkin.  In a bowl combine 8 oz cream cheese, a package of the Garlic & Herbs Alouette cheese, 1 egg, 1/2 teaspoon of Italian seasonings and 1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder. Mix well.  Pour the cheese mixture into the pumpkin. Place on a cookie sheet with the top of the pumpkin next to it. Cover and tent with foil. Cook on 350 degrees for 45 minutes, remove the foil and then cook for another 15 minutes. Be sure not to have too thick of a pumpkin.  You can see a picture of the pumpkin in the second photo of the appetizers.  We served the tip with the flat pretzel chips.

Asian Pear Salad with Spring Greens
I used the vinaigrette from the recipe I made a few weeks ago, Asian Pear and Arugula Salad with Goat Cheese, however today I just made a salad with spring greens and sliced Asian pears.  I made the vinaigrette yesterday and just stored it overnight in the fridge. Today we sliced the pears and stored them separately until we were ready to use them.  Be sure as you slice the pears to squeeze some fresh lemon juice over them so they don't begin to brown. About 10 minutes before we were ready to eat I tossed the greens and pears with the dressing. 

Roasted Beets with Arugula and Orange Vinaigrette
I used this recipe, Roasted Beets with Orange and Herbed Goat Cheese  as the inspiration for the salad we made.  I actually had intended on putting goat cheese on the salad today but completely forgot to add it.  However, I don't even think it was needed, the salad turned out great without it.

The red beets were roasted on 400 degrees for about an hour. Bake in a oven safe dish and put about 1/4-1/2 inch of water on bottom of pan. We had about 18 beets. Cover with foil while roasting. Reserve the juices.  We peeled them once they cooled and then stored them overnight in the fridge.  I followed the directions in the recipe to cook the golden beets, however I only used 3 extra large beets.  Due to the size of the beets they ended up cooking for a little over an hour. You know they are done when you can easily pierce them with a fork. These were also peeled once they cooled off. 
I squeezed the juice from the roasted orange along with the roasted garlic into a mixing bowl.  Add to the bowl the following and whisk together, 1/2 cup of olive oil, 1 1/2 teaspoons of crushed garlic, 1 1/2 cup of fresh squeezed orange juice, 1/2 cup of the reserved juice from roasting the beets. Season with a dash of salt and fresh ground pepper.  Zest of 1 orange. Add chopped fresh tarragon and chives. Store overnight in fridge.

We sliced all of the beets and stored them in a zip lock bag overnight.  Today we placed the sliced beets on a platter and then drizzled them with some of the vinaigrette. I also sprinkled some additional fresh tarragon over the beets.  About 10 minutes before I was ready to serve the salad I mixed a container of baby arugula and some of the vinaigrette in a separate bowl.  I then spread the arugula over the top of the beets. I didn't use all of the vinaigrette on the salad.

Pickled Shrimp with Lemon Chive Aioli
I found this recipe on-line when I was in search of menu items for the shower. It looked delicious, but I was a little nervous about making it for a crowd since I had never had it before.  But I went for it and I am so glad that I did.  So yesterday we sliced the lemons and red onion and stored them separately in zip lock bags.  We doubled the recipe.  We mixed the pickling sauce and stored it in a mason jar overnight.  Rather than making fresh shrimp this morning, we bought 6 lbs of frozen tail on shrimp that were already cooked. This morning we just defrosted them under cold water and the placed them on paper towels to dry.  About 2 hours prior to the shower we mixed the shrimp, lemon slices, red onion and the pickling sauce together in a serving bowl. We also made the aioli yesterday and stored it in the fridge overnight.

We made two types of tarts, a Goat Cheese, Leek and Mushroom Tart and a Rustic Tomato Mozzarella Tart.  Both of these recipes were from Williams-Sonoma.  For the Goat Cheese, Leek and Mushroom Tart we made the Leek, Goat Cheese Creme Fraiche mixture yesterday and then refrigerated it until this morning.  We also sauteed the mushrooms ahead of time and then stored them in the fridge overnight.  Today we made assembled and made the tarts so that they were finished right before we were ready to serve them.  We did take both the leek mixture and the mushrooms out of the fridge and brought them to room temperature before assembling the tarts.

For the tomato tart the only thing we were able to do yesterday was slice the tomatoes.  We simply stored them in a zip lock bag overnight.  We made 3 of the tomato tarts and 2 of the Leek and Mushroom Tarts.

Last but not least, the Beef Tenderloin Sandwiches.  I have made this recipe in the past; you can find the details on my post from July called Good Food, Great Friends. This post contains the recipes for the Beef Tenderloin, the Dijon Horseradish Sauce and Caramelized Onions.  We increased the recipe significantly since we made 15 lbs of tenderloin.  The beef was in the marinade for approximately 3 hours before we grilled it.  We grilled the tenderloins yesterday, stored them in the fridge overnight and then reheated them in the oven about two hours before the shower.  We sliced the meat ahead of time so that we could assemble the sandwiches.  We also made the caramelized onions yesterday and then re-heated them in the oven while the meat was being heated. The Dijon Horseradish sauce can also be made the night before as long as it is refrigerated.  We doubled the recipe for the sauce.

To prepare the sandwiches we used dinner rolls and potato rolls. (As you can see in the photo one of the potato rolls really stood out).  We added 2 slices of beef and some of the caramelized onions to each sandwich.  We left the Dijon Horseradish Sauce out in a bowl for people to add themselves. We also had additional caramelized onions out on the buffet.

You will have to excuse some of the photos as I didn't have my good camera with me.  I hope everyone who attended the shower enjoyed all of the food.  Somehow I didn't get pictures of any of the desserts. But they were delish.  I am going to have to post the apple cake recipe at a later date.  The pumpkin bars were absolutely divine.  My mom made them and used the Paula Deen Pumpkin Bar recipe, I was shocked when I saw that there was only a half of cup of butter in the frosting. 

Congratulations to Becky and Thierry! I can't wait to meet the little guy!