Diane’s Picnic

For years my co-workers in the Pharma PR group have been holding a Summer Picnic. The PR group dissolved about 3 years ago but the friendships in that group were so strong the picnic continue. This year the picnic returned to Diane’s after being at Laurie and PK’s last year.  The highlight of the picnic is getting together with friends and catching up but I am going to write on the food. LOL, you had to be there to get the gossip. Actually, I am just going to write on the salads, cause after the Memorial Day Burger Search, my physician has threaten a colonoscopy if I didn’t eat my salad. LOL. So let’s just say I didn’t eat any of the wonderful hot dogs and burgers that Diane grilled or any of the other foods (dips, fruit desserts, chips, adult beverages) the rest of the group brought. No photos – no evidence.

Julie, the birthday girl, had to leave early but we sang Happy Birthday to her and she left us her Chopped Veggie Salad. Julie obviously took a great deal of time cutting the Tomatoes and Cucumbers into pieces the same size as the Corn kernels. The colourful salad has fresh chopped Basil mixed in. The dressing is very light making the resulting salad very light and fresh in your mouth. The different textures and matching flavours make this a great summer salad.

Nona brought a great Veggie Pasta Salad. Large Rigatoni pasta, Olives, Tomatoes, Broccoli and Parmesan Cheese were the main ingredients in the salad.  The large pasta pieces gave significant body to salad. The “el dente” veggie chunks are a nice contrast to the soft pasta. The light oil dressing helped blend the flavours of the salad creating nice contrast between the sweet Tomatoes and cheese to the salty Olives and slightly bitter broccoli. Great salad, very satisfying.

I brought Caesar Salad ingredient and put them together just before we ate.  I made the dressing at home and that was a good idea as it gave the Garlic and other items time to blend. I like a stong Lemon taste in my dressing so I added it to the dressing as well as provide lemon slices garnishes for individual additions. I have written about this salad before and this one turn out well.  I hope they liked it.

It was good to get together again to catch up, gossip and eat. The salads were great (and so was the other food wink-wink).  Looking forward to next year’s get together and Diane promises it won’t rain. LOL

Let us know your Favourite Salad type is at the blog’s Salad Survey.

Julie shared her recipe today for her Cherry Tomato Corn Salad. Here it is. Thanks Julie and Diane for sharing.

Cherry Tomato Corn Salad

Mix the following in a jar:

¼ cup fresh basil, 3 T Olive Oil, 2 t lime juice, 1 t sugar, ½ t salt & ¼ t pepper

Pour dressing over 2 Cup frozen corn, 2 Cup cherry tomato halved and 1 Cup seeded pealed chopped cucumber

Simple but fresh and tasty.

Cocktails and Apps in New Hope

Co-worker, Neighbour and Facebook friend Tricia and I hit downtown New Hope Friday evening for Happy Hour Cocktails and Appetizers. Tricia was celebrating her big success at a social media conference in NYC and I was celebrating Happy Hour. LOL.

 We planned to meet at the bar at Marsha Brown to have cocktail and appetizers there.  I have found the bar to be more relaxing than the more formal dinning room upstairs in the refurbished church.  As I arrived Tricia had already picked out a nice Rose wine.  I forget how good roses can be especially in the summer.  I eventually got a glass to go with my appetizer and found the Rose to be very refreshing and matching the saltiness of the seafood nicely.

I like to try the different signature cocktails at restaurants.  Marsha Brown offers 6 signature cocktails and I went for the Morgan French Manhattan.  Served ice cold, the cocktail was a classic Manhattan, (rye whiskey, Sweet Vermouth and a maraschino cherry) with the addition of some Grand Marnier. Come to find out Morgan was our bartender and he had created this cocktail.  I liked it, as I do like Manhattans but this one had a strong orange note from Grand Marnier. The sweetness of the orange match well with strength of the Rye Whiskey.  A very good cocktail.  Thanks Morgan.

Tricia went for the Basin Street Mussels as her appetizer. The menu describes them as being “Prince Edward Island Mussels simmered in a Creole barbeque sauce“. When they arrived there was a great smokey aroma that drifted down the bar. It was a great BBQ smell that reminded us of grilled Andouille Sausage. Tricia shared a few mussels with me and they were sweet and the BBQ sauce gave them a little heat and a smokey flavour that matched well and completed the dish.

Marsha Brown serves customers Bread, Butter and Red Bean Hummus. Boy, did the bread come in handy as the mussel were eaten and the BBQ sauce and mussel broth. The sweetness and smokiness of the BBQ sauce and salty sweetness of the mussels being mopped up by the crusty bread was very nice.  Thanks for sharing Tricia. 

 

 

For my appetizer, I went for a combo plate of two of Five Different types of Oysters. It was an impressive plate with pairs of oysters, home-made seafood sauce, lemons, crackers and Louisiana Hot Sauce. Our barman Morgan shared with us that the Creole folks prefer Louisiana Hot Sauce and the Cajun folks preferring the Tabasco Hot Sauce.  I found the Louisiana sauce did go well with oysters. As for the varieties of oysters they are starting at one o’clock and going clockwise are Emerald, St. Simon, Kumomoto, Winanno and Charleston. I liked the little Kumomoto oysters the best as they were slightly salty on the outside with a sweet flesh when you bite into them. The Emerald oysters were my least favourite as they were large but kinda bland but the other three were good. I love the idea that I get to customize each oyster with some combination of lemon juice, hot sauce, seafood sauce or just au natural. By mixing the combination it seemed like I had way more than five different oysters. I hope you try the oysters and let me know what you think in the comment section.

After slurping the oysters and mopping up the mussel BBQ sauce we went for a short walk around New Hope and ended up at the Login Inn for a Margarita.  The hot evening was great for people watching off the patio bar deck at the Login. Even better was the ice cold margarita with the smokey Tequila, sour lime juice, sweet Triple Sec and Salt rim. A wonderful mixture of flavours and sensations.

Thanks Tricia for a great Happy Hour of Cocktails and Apps.  Let’s do it again soon.

 

These were great appetizers but let us know what your Favourite Appetizer Type is at the Blog Food Survey. Take the poll here.

 

Read other reviews about Marsha Brown’s here, here and here.

Marsha Brown Creole Kitchen and Lounge – 15 South Main Street – New Hope, PA 18938