I love a good party. Of course, I'm a nerd, so for me a good party means me and a bunch of my nerdbuds sitting around, playing games, talking shit, and eating food. Your mileage may vary. The point for this blog is the food. So here are some pictures and notes.

VEGETARIAN STEAMED DUMPLINGS:

The top picture is how I served them at the party, boiled and drained - the bottom is from today, steamed and more carefully shot. This is the Alton Brown tofu dumpling recipe, modified to remove the egg (in case any vegans showed up) and with a bit more red bell pepper. Oh, and no cilantro.

PORK BAO FROM SCRATCH:

These, for me, were the holy shit I cannot believe we made these ourselves revelatory dish of the year. There'll be a separate post up soon with the full recipe. These were reheated from frozen, which took a bit of practice and a few sliced open to reveal a cold hard center before I got the hang of it.

LEMONGRASS SHRIMP DUMPLINGS:

These are the dumplings made with the lemongrass-shrimp filling. Really good with Thai sweet chili sauce, which I tried to make from a Tyler Florence recipe, and it was thin and tasted like shit, so I just bought some at Target, of all places.

BUTTERNUT/GOAT CHEESE TORTELLONI:

It looks a bit orange there, but I actually made a quick basil oil to squeeze onto the butternut/goat cheese tortelloni, which worked really, really well. Just two cups of fresh basil, one cup of olive oil, a couple pinches of salt, buzzed in the food processor. There are more elaborate techniques involving blanching, cooking, and straining you can find online, but I was lazy and it was still good.

CHOCOLATE MINI-CUPCAKES WITH COCOA/SOUR CREAM FROSTING:

Cathy's dessert offering, from a recipe she got from her sister - very chocolatey, not too sweet, and bite-size. I'm glad I like these so much, because we still have a ton left over.