Small supper club: bread and butter, cucumber salad, roasted garlic hummus, lemon thyme sorbet, steak and pomme pave, lemon panna cotta

Hello! Home cook, feedback appreciated. Last post was deleted as flair wasn’t active (I assume) so reposting here.

This is a small supper club I threw for some friends – 8 total guests. First one of this type we’ve done, and first time doing a large coursed meal with individual plating like this. Some things went well, some very badly. total time was about 90 minutes. Recipes for the most part developed by me. I (obviously) have no training.

Bread and butter – milk bread bun, butter was 1/3 applewood cold smoked, 1/3 browned butter (whipped), and 1/3 burnt honey caramel using cold unsmoked butter instead of butter + cream, all three whipped and topped with maldon

Cucumber salad – went well. Initial version had thinly sliced scallions shocked in ice water, ran out of time (and scallions). Chive oil for this was made with 1/2 chinese garlic chives to better complement flavors.

Hummus with confit roasted garlic – was served as one plate per 4 guests, with a selection of flatbreads (no pictures)

Lemon thyme sorbet – made using a lemon peel and thyme oleo saccharum as the base for the sugar syrup. Less sweet than I would normally make a sorbet, but meant to be a small palate cleanser. The WORST attempt at a quenelle, but the only one I have a picture of.

Steak, pomme pave, roasted carrot puree – bit of a disaster. I did not have time to thicken the sauce sufficiently and my counters are extremely sloped/I didn’t think to have something on the plate to “catch” the chive oil. Would definitely redo this plating completely. The roasted carrot puree had roasted garlic and shallots in a deep beef broth , one of my favorite parts of the whole meal.

Lemon panna cotta – layered blueberry sauce at the bottom, lemon/vanilla panna cotta. Mint fluid gel did not finish setting before it was blended I think, leading to it thickening after blending. Was far too thick this time around.

Overall, flavors were good, I was happy with some of the platings, hated the plating of the entree. Next time will probably do 4 courses instead to minimize mistakes.

I kind of understand where you are coming from with regards to the plating (not that I would fare any better). But the food – oh my, any chance there is an opening in your supper club? This is the first time in my Reddit-history that I have actually taken notes. Thank you so much for providing insight in how you made these dishes.

This is inspiring! Love the idea of a supper club.

The plating that works, really works. And the plating that doesn’t…really does suffer. Green was not the color of the evening!

The lemon panna cotta is a lovely surprise with the blueberry. But the green mint dots you have, I think, even if they did work out, give me pause with the color. Maybe smaller dots—and certainly a more appealing hue of green (more lime than hunter-green).

Main course probably needed a smaller plate. There’s a lot of one-sided plating/decoration going on overall. It feels like forced “creative” and what you might think “good” culinary plating might look like. Not a chef, but in general believe at its heart, plating is just artistry and having a good feeling for aesthetics (as well as a the manner in which a dish should be received, admired, and obviously eaten), so I would attune to that more rather than trying to artificially make something aesthetically pleasing. The green, again, does the dish no favors.

The sorbet suffers, I think, from too small a dish that it’s set in. It makes it feel more like an afterthought, rather than a dish to be savored and enjoyed, and take your time with.

I hope none of this felt harsh, as that wasn’t my intention. Again, I really like this, and it feels like something really fresh and fun to not only see here, but think about incorporating in my own circle. And I really like how you shared your recipes/some of your process with us. As I said, really inspiring, and can’t wait to see what else you all cook up!

    I want to start off by saying excellent food and plating; if you put in just a small amount of improvement into each of these dishes, within weeks you would have, at the very least, an easy M-plate. I think you have perfectly encapsulated the amateurish style in a way that feels deliberate and beautiful. As your ingredients and techniques on your dishes improve, if you can keep this incredible look, it would be amazing.

    This reminds me of the period of my life when I decided food was my life’s work. It has all the elements of slowly understanding the field; the meal composition, the flavors of each dish, the plating. Great job OP.

Oh man, you sounds so much like myself when judging my own food. You made a phenomenal meal, good job, you have an amazing talent op!