dinner for 10

Krestia and I hosted 8 people for dinner this past Thursday night. Four of my aunts were here for a week and a half on a vacation to Alaska. We had them over for dinner their last night here along with my cousin, his wife and their two kids. I've never served dinner to that many people. It was a lot of work but great fun. The menu:

Spinach salad with strawberries, spring onions, goat cheese and almonds with balsamic viniagrette
Roasted potatoes with rosemary
Salmon with breadcrumb, olive and sun-dried tomato crust (from epicurious). We made this with fresh Cook Inlet red salmon that I bought earlier the same day from New Sagaya Market.
2 bottles of pinot noir
Rustic pear tart (made by my husband, similar to one he made last year)

Here we are busily cooking together just after the aunts arrived. Note the matching aprons, a gift from my mother. :) (photo courtesy of my Aunt Joyce):



A few things I learned:
1. One more chair would have been nice so Krestia wouldn't have had to eat standing up. :)
2. I need a bigger oven and more baking pans if I'm going to try to bake salmon, potatoes and a pastry dessert at the same time. :) I should have had dessert made the day before but time constraints prevented that.
3. I should have looked harder for roasting potatoes. I used baking potatoes which fell apart with the high temperatures and frequent stirring while roasting. Still, they tasted good.

Now we are prepared for more dinner parties! Come on over, I'll cook up a good meal.