We created this rosemary hors d'oeuvre wreath for a client's pre-lunch get together with three friends today. Our client wanted something compact, as her condo is quite small, and we thought this would fit the bill nicely. On a quiche dish, we layered rosemary branches in the shape of a wreath, and studded it with pistachio-encrusted grape and chevre truffles, parmesan tuile cups with a colourful heirloom tomato salad, and cayenne chocolate-covered bacon strips.

For the chocolate-covered bacon, we fried the bacon until it was nice and crisp, cut it in half while it was still warm (to avoid cracking), and let it cool before dipping it in melted chocolate and sprinkling it with cayenne pepper.

The parmesan tuile cups were made by baking shredded parmesan and draping them over a small glass while they were hot. They'll be filled by the hostess with the heirloom tomato salad just prior to her guests arriving in order to avoid the cups becoming soggy.

Red seedless grapes were covered in chevre, and rolled in crushed pistachios to create little truffles.

What interesting hors d'oeuvres are you serving at your holiday parties this year?

Love,
Ashley, Jen and Alessandra

We're busy planning Christmas parties, and we've come up with a delicious holiday menu! The cold menu below is perfect for drop-off catering. We can, of course, come up with a personalized menu just for your event - this is just an example of a prix-fixe menu.

(Contact us for our mixed hot and cold menu, our holiday dessert menu, or for a quote!)

Cold Holiday Menu

A. Antipasto

Rosemary antipasto wreath                 +         Cheese truffle pops
(can include 4 of: marinated                           (pistachio goat cheese or
olives, pickles, tomatoes, artichokes,              cranberry walnut, with artisan crisps)    
cocktail onions, kielbasa)

OR

Fruit and cheese tree                        +         Antipasto skewers
(selection of local cheeses                           (can include marinated olives,
with seasonal fruit and                                  pickles, tomatoes, artichokes,
artisan crisps)                                                cocktail onions, kielbasa)

B. Cold Hors D’oeuvres (passed as necessary, but stationary as space permits)

Select from the following:

1.    Caprese salad bites (2 per guest)
2.    Curried vegetable hand pies (1.5 per guest)
3.    Mini tourtiere wonton cups (2 per guest)
4.    Parmesan lace crackers with heirloom tomato salad (2 per guest)
5.    Parmesan cups with baby romaine cesar salad (1.5 per guest)
6.    Prosciutto-wrapped beet-pickled eggs (2 per guest)
7.    Dried apricots with basil goat cheese and almonds (3 per guest)
8.    Thai rice wrap rolls with sriracha peanut dipping sauce (1.5 per guest)
9.    Chilled asian noodle cucumber cups (2 per guest)
10.  Roasted vegetable and baba ghanouj mini pitas (1.5 per guest)
11.  Onion confit and pumpkin seed-topped cucumber rounds (2 per guest)
12.  Onion confit and thinly sliced beef crostini (1.5 per guest)

C. Dip

Garlic cheddar OR jalapeno artichoke, with selection of artisan crisps.


What's on your holiday menu?

Love,
Ashley, Jen and Alessandra

We are so excited to share the vintage farm birthday party that we threw last week for a very special little farmer! 

The decorations included plenty of vintagized grape crates, a party animal chandelier, mason jar candles, wooden farm equipment made by the birthday boy's grandfather, and the rustic birthday banner we featured a few weeks back.

In order to celebrate the birthday boy, The Party Planning Committee created a chalkboard our of grape crate lidsand wrote down all of his 'stats', and strung up lots of pictures of his first year!

Green cutlery was wrapped in orange napkins and tied with twine to look like carrots.

Mini guests adopted stuffed dog "farm puppies" as their favours. There is a free printable available on our blog here for the thank you tags. The same thank you tags were also used to label chocolate-dipped pretzel rods for the adults.

On the "mini" menu was:

• Sliders on homemade pretzel buns (we shaped the patties using a cookie cutter and followed this recipe for the pretzel buns)
• 2 kinds of mini pizzas (goat cheese with red onion, sundried tomato and kalamata olive, and meat lovers)
• Bacon-wrapped dates
• Mini "baked potatoes" (new potatoes baked in the oven, topped with sour cream and chives)
• Fresh veggies in ranch sauce
• An olive and pickle platter

For dessert, french vanilla cupcakes were dressed as sheep with the help of mini white chocolate chips and fondant faces.

The two-tiered lemon and french vanilla birthday cake featured fully edible fondant farm animals, and was surrounded by peanut-free haystacks (made with marshmallows instead of the traditional peanut butter).

The cake smash was, of course, done atop the scalloped splash mat we featured here.

The photobooth was decked out with farm-related props, including a cowboy hat and mini straw hats, bunny ears, a pig nose, mustaches (not so on-theme, but very necessary!) and fill-in-the-blank speech bubbles.

All in all, we think it was a night to remember! What do you think?

Love,
Ashley, Jen and Alessandra

Full details of the vintage farm party we threw this past weekend are coming shortly - but, in the meantime, we've made a free printable of the adorable tags worn by the farm puppy favours!

Each puppy wore one of three thank you tags, complete with a vintage cow, rooster, or pig, and a joke. 

Instructions:

1. Download and print the PDF file at the bottom of this post onto cardstock. 
2. Punch out each tag with a 2" circle punch.
3. Thread a large needle with baker's twine or yarn and 'sew' through the space at the top of the tag to create a hanging thank you tag. We found it easiest to put the tag on of a piece of cardboard and poke the needle through, removing the cardboard before pushing the needle all the way through the tag.

Enjoy!

Love,
Ashley, Jen and Alessandra

Great parties are built around themes, and, themes are often built around colour.

This image is from a fun and colourful summer wedding that was planned and executed by The Party Planning Committee (see more pics of this gorgeous wedding here). The PPC hung strands of clear rock candy topped with simple silver ribbon on manzanita branches to frame the candy buffet.

While the colour scheme for the event as a whole was much brighter, this picture captures how the splashy scheme was balanced with neutral elements to bring the level of sophistication way up!

Last weekend, The Party Planning Committee was honoured to help set up a fabulous venue for a baptism celebration dinner for the sweetest and most handsome five-month-old twin boys, Oliver and Gabriel. The dinner was held at El Mazaj, a Lebanese restaurant in the east end of Ottawa. 

The twins' talented mother, who also has a two-year-old son, planned the event from start to finish, including booking the venue, ordering desserts for the sweets table, creating the bombonieres, ordering invitations and flowers for the centrepieces, and coordinating the helpers for the day-of. 

In order for the twins' mother to enjoy herself on the day of the baptism (and get three little boys ready!), The Party Planning Committee was enlisted to transport everything to the venue, set up chair covers, arrange favours, create and set up centrepieces, and liaise with restaurant staff. 

ThePPC also set up green uplighting in order to reinforce the brown and green colour scheme (our uplighting is available for rent in any colour of the rainbow!).

We feel blessed to have been a part of such a beautiful celebration that was so well-planned!

Contact us today for an estimate on uplighting rental and day-of event coordination!

Love,
Ashley, Jen and Alessandra