Thursday 19 May 2011

a green dinner party fling

I recently hosted a sustainable dinner party for some of my foodie friends. I went with an Italian theme, and used my chalkboard wall as a menu board, naming the 'restaurant' Ristorante Biologico (which I think is the translation for Organic Restaurant).

As mentioned in a green wine fling, eating organics is good for our personal health, that of the planet, and requires less energy to grow.  As a result, the bulk of the food in the sustainable dinner party menu was organic. Thankfully I'd recently been introduced to  Lettuce Deliver, an organic produce company that delivers any organic food you can dream of direct to your door.  You can order pre-arranged boxes or select individual items from their huge selection of fresh fruit and vegetables, dairy, meat and other grocery products. Despite living in a relatively green suburb, my local shops have a pathetic selection of organic produce, so Lettuce Deliver made it possible to create my organic menu (I now have a regular weekly delivery, too).

To further lessen the eco-footprint of the dinner, we avoided meat, served Tamburlaine organic wine, used homegrown chillies in the arrabiatta sauce and selected blue swimmer crab for the pasta dish because it's positively rated in Australia's Sustainable Seafood Guide.  We also ate by beeswax candlelight and used cloth napkins.

I did incorporate one small treat that wasn't totally green - dark chocolate macarons from Adrian Zumbo to go with my vegan semifreddo (recipe courtesy of Peppermint magazine).  They were totally worth it.

I've been eating green at home for awhile, but this was the first time I'd endeavoured a large formal feast, and based on all the yummy sounds and empty plates, I think it was a hit.

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