Charity Pudding Club

Charity Pudding Club for itsgood2give

Sunday 6 April, 1.30 pm

Price £25 per ticket.  Book now – call 07950431463 or email wendy(at)wendypaterson.com to book.

We will have sixteen seats and all money will go to itsgood2give, a local children’s cancer charity. Mackies of Scotland are donating the ingredients. Reeltime bars will be donating a cocktail to start the event. Insideoutchef will be giving her time and providing the venue.

Menu
  • Starter – trio of puddings
  • 2nd course – apple crumble with jugs of custard
  • 3rd course – pillow of pavlova
  • 4th course – cheesecake
  • Final course — make your own ice-cream sundaes

Tea, coffee and iced water will be served at your table — please feel free to bring your own wine, fizz or soft drinks of your choice.

 

Forthcoming Pudding Club – April 6th, 2014

Charity Pudding Club for itsgood2give

Mackies of Scotland are donating the ingredient costs and I will be donating my time and the venue. Reeltime Bar will be supplying delightful cocktails to start the event off.

You will also have a goodie bag to take home. We plan on having five courses of pudding, including a trio of individual deserts, apple crumble, pavlova, cheesecake and make-your-own ice-cream sundaes. Here are some pictures from last time around…

You can bid now for tickets, minimum bid is £25, by visiting https://surveymonkey.com/s/mackiespopuppuddingclub

All money raised will be going to itsgood2give; see http://www.itsgood2give.co.uk/

Pudding Club and Other News

This week has been another exciting and busy week for me here at Inside Out Chef and this is the first chance I’ve had to sit down, write something and reflect on the experiences of the week, as well as a chance to thank those who’ve helped me out this week or attended the inaugural Pudding Club.

Afternoon Tea

At the start of the week, I had an afternoon tea to organize for a local company that has decided to use my Afternoon Tea to reward their staff. Normally for someone living in Edinburgh I would happily deliver, though in this case the recipient lives in Drem, North of Stirling, so her boss collected a cool bag and a picnic hamper full of goodies and vintage china, the feedback I got was that she felt very spoiled. The lady in question was very excited and kindly her boss sent me a photo of her enjoying her treat.

Pudding Club

The preparations for the Pudding Club kicked off on in the middle of the week with a delivery of supplies. I started off by writing a check list of what had to be done, and wrote down the exact time to start cooking or making each pudding. The buzz on Twitter from prospective attendees was building. First the first Pavlovas were made and allowed to ‘sleep’ in the oven overnight.

Next day it was the turn of the Pomegranate Jelly and Panna Cotta, and in the evening, the second Pavlova was made and allowed to ‘sleep’ overnight in the oven.

Thanks to Lea Harris – @Bakersbunny – she kindly loaned me her ice-cream maker, no need to freezer bowls just make, chill and freezer so an afternoon of ice-cream making.

Reinforcements were needed the day before the event, so my mum came over the help- she cleaned and set the tables, polished glasses and made my lunch, a nice treat for me. That same afternoon, the chocolate mousse was made, along with the baked cheesecake and the fridge cheesecake.

At 1pm I was joined by Paul Johnston from CopperMango – Paul was coming to take some professional shots of my pudding for my website.

I had decided to make individual Sticky Toffee Puddings – topped with toffee sauce.

Paul took some wonderful shots of the trio of starters, the baker Rum and Raisin Cheesecake and the sticky toffee pudding.

Early to bed, so I could make the most of Saturday, the last item on my check-list was to make the Pink lemonade – the pink colour came from Raspberries.

Toffee sauce and custard made, quick change and my first guest texted to say due to excitement they where early and would it be OK to come in, this was lovely and so I went to let them in. I had said on the email to everyone that the starter would be at 7.20 by 7.10pm the crowd was gathered. They took their seats and the Club started.

Above are the trio of starters- panna cotta, pomegranate jelly and chocolate mousse. Here was the last course – a trio of home-made ice-creams and a shortbread biscuit. The flavours were coconut and ginger, key lime piece and red berry ripple.

 

What Others Said

I am so delighted that several of the guests kindly wrote their own blog posts to describe their experiences- I hope everyone enjoyed themselves and each seemed to have their own favourite pudding- you can  read what they have said below and a huge thank-you to each of them for taking the time to share their thoughts and the pictures they took.

I really enjoyed planning and arranging the Pudding Club and it will not be a one off- I have promised to do another one later in the Summer though perhaps with a twist; subscribe to my mailing list through this website so as not to miss out when the tickets become available and to find out more on what the next one will be.

Winter Warmers Event – November

My next supper club will take place on the 12th November, 2011.

The theme for this event will be “Winter Warmers” – soups, stews, pies and delectable puddings. The menu will be published closer to the time.

Those who attended the first event went home “dreaming of cheesecake” and “wanting the recipe for the chilli”, and I look forward to welcoming you to my home.

If you would like to secure your place, please click on the Pay Now on the right. Note that you can pay for up to four tickets/deposits with this option.

Note: please note this is a home restaurant, we have one sitting and once I have purchased the food, the event night is the only opportunity I have to sell it- I don’t have a second evening, so if you have to cancel, please aim to do so within 72 hours of the evening to allow me time to resell your space.

If you do need to cancel less than 72 hours before the event, please call me on 07950 431 463 (please do not cancel via email). Thank you, Wendy.

My First Supper Club


My First Supper Club

Well, what a fab night- after all the preparation and cooking, the night went off really well and it all wound down about midnight. My husband performed miracles in keeping the dishes under control all evening and the kitchen was tidier throughout the evening than I’ve ever seen it when he’s been responsible for anything in it. My friend who was front of house did magnificently well and quite a few people commented on how professional she was.

In the morning we had a few call off’s we went from 17 to 13 at first I was worried but it allowed us to have one big table right down the middle of the room. So I have decided that my supper club will be for 14 not 20 so the first lesson I learnt – smaller is better.

I was calm at first, and it was not until 6.30pm, with about 30 minutes to go, that the nerves kicked in – I started thinking, what if no-one turns up, what if they did not enjoy the food, what if no one speaks to each other. Anyway all these fears were to be proved unfounded.

At 7.30pm, people were mingling and sipping cocktails and eating nibbles. By 7.45pm, everyone was seated for the starter boards, rolls and bread from Andente in Morningside – something for everyone – the marinated peppers where a great hit.


The second thing I learnt over the course of the evening was to allow people time to enjoy their food – by 8.30 we were clearing the starters and allowing them a lull before the main course.

Unlike a commercial restaurant, where you might start eating by 7 and be out by 9, we had only one sitting and no worry about when people would leave, letting the evening wind down naturally.

With one big table, we decided to put out two large pots of choc chip chilli, accompanied by two large pots of rice, three large dishes of chicken enchiladas.

Everyone enjoyed sharing and discussing their choice not plating up allowed everyone to decide how much they wanted or if they wanted second or even thirds.

On the home straight now, puddings plated up in the kitchen – white chocolate and raspberry cheese cake accompanied with a sparkling wine and pomegranate jelly, which gave everyone something sweet and something tart – empty plates came back.

Coffee on and I could leave the kitchen – everyone seemed to have enjoyed their evening, some may have questioned supper clubs – how can they grow, who would come back, will I believe more people will come back or try a different supper club in the near future.

Everyone paid up and some even left a tip – so thank you all.

Will I do it again YES date for the next Teaclub Supper Club will be the 12th of November 2011.

Wendy’s Supper Club – First Event – 27th August

Welcome to my blog for one of the newest Supper Clubs in Edinburgh – I’m delighted to announce our first Supper Club will be held on 27th August, 2011. If you are interested, reserve your places by buying tickets or paying deposits for each place, which you can do securely through PayPal from the right hand sidebar on this site. You can also drop me a line through the Contact page; for instance, please do that if you are attending and you want to tell me about special dietary requirements, such as vegetarian, don’t eat fish, coeliacs, etc.

I’ve been an enthusiastic cooking hobbyist for the last twenty years. A couple of months ago, I was lucky enough to be in London and was really inspired to hear Kerstin Rodgers, who wrote “Supper Club: recipes and notes from The Underground Restaurant” talk. She spoke about her Underground Restaurant, which was perhaps the first in the UK. You can read Kerstin’s blog at http://marmitelover.blogspot.com/ and there is another brilliant blog by a friend of hers at http://bakelady.wordpress.com/

One of the things that she says in her book is that supper clubs are great for “lone diners, and women in particular may feel uncomfortable in going alone to restaurants on a Saturday night; large mixed tables remove that stigma”.

Please note that the appearance of this blog is going to be changing a bit whilst I get my head round all this blogging stuff and don’t be surprised if it looks quite different the next time you check in on this site. You can also follow me on twitter (@insideoutchef)