We’ve already established that Maggi, founder of the cookbook club I was lucky enough to join, is a mad genius. But her greatest stroke of genius—or perhaps just her most recent one—was when she decided our January meeting should be a cocktail party.
Yes, in the month after all the holiday parties, the month when everyone goes on a diet and stays home, she decided we needed another party. And you know what, she was right.
January is a pretty dark and dreary month around these parts. The days are short, the sky is grey when it’s not black, and after all the glitter and lights of the holidays, things can begin to drag. It’s exactly when you need to plan a party.
And this wasn’t going to be just any party—it was going to be a dress up cocktail party, girls only, in the private party room at our friend’s high rise condo building.
Basically it was going to be an excuse to dress up and hang out with your friends in an utterly no pressure environment where it was all about relaxing and having a good time. This was going to be fun.
Our book for the month was Gourmet Game Night, by friend and local food writer Cynthia Nims. All the recipes in the book are things you can eat easily and one-handed, so you can play board games or do some serious chatting and mingling. Some of the recipes are things I never would have thought of—large pasta shells stuffed with kale and ricotta, seasoned cubes of tuna poke scooped up with endive leaves. One of my favorite dishes of the evening were these pretzel sticks with three different types of mustard. And the nearly empty platter to the left holds the last of the Roasted Red Potatoes with Bacon-Chive Creme Fraiche, which I will definitely make again.
There are cocktail recipes in the book as well—Pomegranate-Mint Fizz, Key Lime Gimlets, Kir Royale Floats. And dessert as well. I believe this photo is of the Chocolate Tartlets with Brandy Cream, but I don’t remember entirely. My brain was wiped clean by one taste of the Brown Butter Pound Cake with Caramel Dip. Whoa Nelly.
But really, the thing I want to talk to you about is how much fun it was to have an excuse to dress up. And dress up we did.
There were sparkles in the room.
And cute shoes (also, some blurry picture taking as the night went on).
My shoes were less cute, I admit, but I wore a red, drop-waist flapper dress that twirls when you spin. I really ought to have gotten a proper picture of it, but after a gimlet or two I totally forgot.
But the best part of the night is when the shoes got kicked off and we all ended up in the swimming pool. You know it’s a good party when it ends in the pool. There we all were, in our fancy dresses and jewelry, feet dangling in the warm water, talking, laughing, having a ball.
While the city glittered below us.
And that really is what I’ll remember—how much fun it was to dress up just for ourselves. To pull out the pretty clothes we don’t wear often enough. To make fun fancy food. To have that special holiday sparkly feeling back again, if only just for the evening. We all agreed that we don’t do this sort of thing nearly often enough.
Perhaps cocktail parties need to become a monthly event. Grab your friends, grab your fancy clothes. Throw a party. It was so much more fun than I ever would have guessed.
Happy weekend, friends. I hope you have a good (and maybe even sparkly) one.
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Oh, how fun!!!
Fun! This is such a great idea. We move to italy this summer, and I think I’m going to try to start a cookbook club once I’m out there, as a way to meet people. I know I’d have fun.
how fun! maybe it SHOULD be a monthly requirement.
i better get to planning
I love this idea! I wish I could be a part of your Cookbook Club.
I think everyone should have a cookbook club. Perhaps you can start one of your own!
http://www.teaandcookiesblog.com/2011/09/how-to-start-a-cookbook-club.html
Oh this is pure wunderbar! The pool relaxation in the pretty dresses just takes the cake. This post reinforces my joy in being girly-girl. Glad a kindred spirit like you is revelling in it too…
Seems to be a lot of fun. I do not have a cookbook Club, but I am looking forward for our Pysanki painting starting next Monday – usual we have a lot of fun.
Oh my, this looks like my kind of night. Just saw Cynthia’s bookstore earlier today and loved the idea.
I am so glad to finally read about the RED dress! What fun.
This looks like so much fun! It’s great to get dressed up ‘just because’ sometimes. Sounds like you have a great group of people. Love the pretzel sticks with the different kinds of mustards-cute idea!
Wonderful post! Very timely. I hadn’t thought for a long time how great the company of women can be, or how much fun just to get dressed up. Mad genius is right.
What fun! I was just thinking the other day that it has been ages and ages since I dressed up for anything.
Me was well–happens far too rarely these days. A good reminder of how fun it is.
You have such inspirational ideas . . . Thank You!
Wow that looks like fun.
A lovely idea, especially the dressing up!
Love, love this idea!
great post! love the girls only cocktail party! i thought maybe things got REALLY wild – when i first glanced at the pool picture i felt certain there was a naked person exiting the pool in the background! i simply thought you hadn’t noticed it was in the pic! it honestly took me a few double takes to realize it was a person entering the pool – surely wearing a dress. you managed to take a photo with a very strange optical illusion!
Ha, ha! No, that would have been funny. But I think I would have remembered had there been any naked people. I didn’t drink THAT much!
Ali, I had the same reaction…and that’s ME in the pool! I was holding my dress up and stepping down into the pool, but at first it looked like my knee was a butt! To the gym I go.
Hardly, just a funky angle. Or maybe I was trying to spice things up around here