Friday Quickie vs Designer Dinner Party

Friday nights I don’t cook.

Mainly because it’s just me and my 1 year old at home, so she gets her usual healthy meal, and I – being the oh so healthy girl I am, pretend my stomach is a big green wheelie bin and proceed to fill it with all manner of junk.

I do this because I have no desire to spend an hour making something for myself. If I can zap it – I’ll eat it, but if it requires frying, baking, boiling, grilling or steaming then no. Too much effort.

Tonight I’m planning a super quick meal. The key ingredient is chocolate. Directions for preparing tonight’s meal: open packet of biscuits, remove desired amount of biscuits. Place remaining biscuits in fridge. Serving Suggestion: Enjoy with a glass of Diet Coke.

 I know it’s unhealthy, but it’s quick and there are so few opportunities to get a night alone with the computer / tv / book I’m reading.

Anyway. Tonight’s menu aside… I realised I don’t loathe cooking entirely. But I only enjoy it when I get feedback. Since my husband practically rates each meal I cook out of 10, luckily I enjoy the challenge of preparing him meals. When we have people over, it’s usually for a BBQ – a cooking apparatus I dare not venture towards as I am ‘without penis.’  Instead, I end up being the creator of fairly stock standard salads.

BUT I wonder sometimes (usually after watching those cooking shows on TV) if I could take the heat and live up to the challenge of creating and cooking for a dinner party of 8.

I’ve never had a dinner party. It always sounds so glamorous: to be the hostess of a fabulous dinner party where your guests mingle in your designer lounge room chomping on bite sized delicacies while you effortlessly plate up the Ocean Trout with a Celeriac Rémoulade topped with Beetroot Mousse.

Hmmm. Can you get that catered?

So, I started to imagine having a dinner party. What would I serve? What would I wear? WHO WOULD I INVITE?

In real life I would invite my Darwin friends who have become like family.

In fantasy life (and this is not an original concept by any means) if I could invite anyone, knowing they would actually come, because we are like SO CLOSE, I would invite the following 6 people: (It’s a dinner party for 8, and I’m assuming my husband will want to be there so he can meet all my fabulously gorgeous, successful, famous friends…. Plus I would want him there to take out the rubbish and empty bottles as required)

1. Jack Nicholson – Imagine the stories. I think I would just stare at him all night, the guy is a living legend. I wonder if he would wear his sunnies. Maybe we all could. Although that may impair my ability to see if the roasted lamb loin is actually ready.

2. Madonna – Love her or hate her, you can’t deny she’d be entertaining. I wonder if she’d speak with an English or American accent. I’d want to ask her if Sean Penn snorted coke off her naked body at any time. He seems like the type who would.  I would also try and work out (just quietly to myself) what a 22 year old hot male Brazilian model sees in a 50+ woman who has man hands and wears leotards.

3. Ellen DeGeneres – I just think she’d be hilarious and I think it always helps to have someone present at a dinner party who can make jokes and have everyone laughing – just incase your meal turns out to be rubbish. Actually, I think I would let Ellen choose the music for the night too. KD Lang? FINE by me….

4. Ryan Reynolds – I think Ryan is a talented and highly accomplished actor. That and he’s a MASSIVE spunk. Yeah now that I think about it, no matter how entertaining Jack Nicholson got, I probably wouldn’t be staring at him at all if Ryan was there. I wonder whether or not he would shave for the occasion, and what type of shirt he’d wear. I could tell him not to bother…  Hmmm….

5. Carrie Fischer – Here’s a woman with some life experience under her belt. A self confessed alcoholic she is also an author, actress, and the celebrity child of silver screen stars Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds. She starred in one of the biggest movie trilogies of our time, married a man who turned out to be gay – but not before having his child (fascinating…), and her latest novel: Wishful Drinking, is about to become a doco on HBO.

6. Eddie Murphy – I would just want him to come so that when Ellen tells a joke, I can hear him laugh out loud, live and in person. He has one of those infectious laughs that is so unique and funny. I would also BEG him to break into some of his “Klump Family” roles…. Hercules Hercules….  (I realise if Eddie came, I would have to place a great big swear jar in the middle of the table. It might be interesting to see who ends up contributing more: Eddie, Madge, Carrie or Jack.)

Incidentally, in no way am being cruel when I say this, but if Muhummed Ali was not ‘non compos nientes ‘he would totally have made my list, possibly replacing Ryan. Yes even I would forgo eye candy for some fascinating stories: but I have a hunch his stories got forgotten when his brain cells got beaten to a pulp.

SO…. who would be on your invitation list?