My inaugural Castle Ryan dinner party

I love dinner parties. Indeed, in my former life, Paul and I had monthly dinner parties. We were the only guests at these lavish meals, but we were each other’s favourite guests so that worked for us. I reflect on these joyous events from time to time and sometimes think about bringing them back. But a dinner party for one would be too depressing.

But after buying Castle Ryan and having a couple of people over for simple dinners, I realised that I can now host dinner parties. Complete with multi-course meals, lovely drinks, and a table surrounded by guests.

I still have a lot of work to do at Castle Ryan, but I have a large table and dinner settings for six people*. And hosting a dinner party seemed a good way to christen the dining room. It also served as a good prompt to buy things for the house, such as more linen napkins, trivets, and matching stemware and cocktail glasses.

My first dinner party was held last night with five guests. One of my guests is a vegan whilst another is a Kosher Jew, so I had to create a menu that could be easily adapted to everyone’s dietary requirements. I decided that the best way to do that was to make a vegetarian meal that could be adapted to vegan for one guest. (The menu met the Kosher rules, as confirmed by that guest in advance.)

On arrival, I served margaritas on the rocks using a set of vintage cocktail glasses I found in a Morningside charity shop, along with pico de gallo and tortilla chips. I’ve decided that pitcher cocktails is the way to go for dinner parties as I can make them ahead and not have to mix different concoctions for each guest. (Although cocktail parties would have more variety!)

After taking their seats at the table, guests were served tortilla soup as a starter. I used vegetable broth instead of chicken broth and omitted the shredded chicken, adding extra black beans instead. The soup was served with fresh avocado and cilantro and a dollop of crème fraiche – omitted for the vegan.

The main course was a simple black bean burrito with Mexican rice and a fresh avocado and tomato salad. I served a simple Rioja for the wine option. The burritos were a recipe I “invented” a few years ago that I find people enjoy. I made a large dish of the normal recipe then a second, smaller dish that skipped the cheese. The rice recipe was also adapted to use vegetable broth instead of chicken.

When the main meal was done, we enjoyed some homemade mango sorbet served with fresh mango. It was the first time I made sorbet but it was so easy to make that I will certainly add it to my dessert repertoire!

After dessert, we enjoyed coffee and tea with some simple Mexican candies before my guests departed for home laden with leftovers and promises of recipes to follow by email. I then started the clean-up process which meant putting food away, starting the dishwasher, and stacking dishes for washing in the morning.

And now, less than 12 hours after my guests departed Castle Ryan, I am ready to run a couple more loads in the dishwasher in between my busy plan of eating leftovers and resting on the couch.

I think it’s fair to say that my first dinner party here at Castle Ryan was a success – and I hope there will be many more of them to come. Ideally, I would host a monthly dinner party with friends. It would be lovely to have people join in with all the dressing up and total pretention and la-de-da of it all, complete with multi-course meals enjoyed with music and candlelight… and maybe a bit of dancing. However, that might be a little too la-de-da for most people. Still, I can always hope.

I don’t have another dinner party planned yet, but I have already started thinking about different menu options and different sets of friends I could invite for evenings of food and fun. Life here at Castle Ryan is looking very delicious!

* When I finally bring my FiestaWare over from America, I’ll have settings for 12!