The Cook Book Book Club Christmas Tea, Meeting #6

As anyone who might be following this intermittent blog will quickly realize, I love going to take tea. I look for possibilities when I am traveling, and we have several places we frequent (not quite the right word) here in Los Angles. If I wouldn't be as big as a house and if I could afford it, I'd probably do tea at least once a month, but several times a year is the more likely occurrence. I always try to take tea when I am in San Diego for Comic-con, and we usually plan to go for tea when Susan Ellison's birthday rolls around in June. If we fit some shopping in after Christmas, a trip to Beverly Hills and tea is in order. If I'm lucky, I go out for tea at least one other time during the year. If there's the possibility of a Triple Crown winner, I throw the Belmont Tea on the first Saturday in June. (You'll find a post about the most recent Belmont Tea somewhere below in 2015.)

A Table for 16, with Teapots

Breaking the rules for a Christmas Tea for the Cook Book Book Club seemed like a no-brainer. We did not stick to one book. Instead, people were encouraged to produce a recipe they liked, no matter what the source, and bring a copy of the recipe to share. We had some over-achievers who decided to bring more than one dish and I really did feel like I couldn't even sample everything that my friends  brought. It was a LOT of food.

My Overfilled Plate

The menu:

Savories

Chopped Chicken Liver--Kim Gottlieb-Walker
Salmon Salad--Kim Gottlieb-Walker
Cucumber Sandwiches-- Michelle Heinig Resnick
Chicken Finger Sandwiches--Laurie Perry
Egg Salad Finger Sandwiches--Melinda Snodgrass
Luxe Truffle Deviled Eggs--Sharon D. Baker
Lobster Cheese Cakes-- Christine Valada
Tomato-Cheddar Tartlets-- Mary De Longis
Anchovy Roulades-- Gillian Horvath
Fig & Ricotta Crisp Breads--Liz Mortensen
Pears Poached in Red Wine--T Valada Viars

Scones

Lemon Curd--Laurie Perry
Black Forest Jam--Kerry Glover
Clotted Cream-Julia Roberts
Ginger Scones--Lisa Klink
Scones--Laura Brennan

Sweets

Chocolate Cream Cheese Brownies--Nan Cohen
Mom's Lemon Shortbread Squares--Gillian Horvath
Cherry Pielettes--Kerry Glover
Grandma's Strawberry Jam Strudel--Kim Rebecca Gottlieb-Walker

Teas

Earl Grey

Chocolate

Ginger

Green

The table was set using Lenox Holiday china, with several variations in the cups. Lenox has produced Holiday for years. Some of the varieties include Presidential, Holly Berry, and Holiday Hostess (all off-white with a gold trim), with a number of different shapes, but they all work quite well together. I used the Holiday dinner plates for the first course, and the luncheon-sized Holiday Hostess plates for the scones and sweets. Flatware was the Lenox stainless Holiday pattern with the inset of a china oval bearing the holly leaf and berries. There were a variety of serving implements that have been acquired over the years to go with the pattern, from stainless with the holly and berries in relief to acrylic handled servers in red or red and green. Stemware, not shown in the early stages of setting the table, above, was Longchamps. I used both the waters (technically, the iced teas) and the champagnes.

Because we decided to meet at 4:00 P.M., traditional tea time, the light wasn't as good as it might be and I actually missed out on photographing many of the dishes. We moved my dining room table to the living room to have enough room for the eighteen people I originally expected, but we were down to sixteen before we sat down. Holidays do get in the way, sometimes. I wasn't really happy with how the pictures came out, but I will post what I did manage. (If anyone who attended wants to add more, please send them to me to put up.)

Food, Glorious Food

Hats were optional, but lots of us went with hats. I think I bought one the weekend before at a flea market. From left, above, going around the table, it looks like Kim Gottlieb-Walker, Julia Roberts, Michelle Resnick, Lisa Klink, Melinda Snodgrass, T Valada-Viars, Laurie Perry, Nan Cohen, Laura Brennan, and Kerry Glover standing.

The rest of the table, thanks to Kerry Glover.

In the second photograph of the table, you can see me in a red hat, Sharon Baker and Liz Mortensen on my left, and Mary DeLongis and Gillian Horvath to my right.

I had the sinking realization that I had an inadequate number of sugar and creamers for a group this large that matched the dinnerware. I am working on fixing that for next time.

Gillian Horvath and her Rose Marie Apron

Gillian's Anchovy Roulades

Several people finished dishes in the kitchen, which was quite crowded just before seating. Gillian Horvath was slicing her roulades for baking, from the wonderful book Afternoon Tea at Home by Will Torrent. Torrent has worked at several notable tea rooms in London and the book is stunning. Every dish has a photograph, and the photographs are gorgeous.

A Recommended Reference

I purchased the book last summer and recommended it to several people. Liz Mortensen  and T Valada-Viars made their contributions from the same book.

Luxe Truffle Deviled Eggs and Cucumber Sandwiches

Sharon Baker's Luxe Truffle Deviled Eggs along with Michelle Resnick's Cucumber Sandwiches.

Chicken Tea Sandwiches

Laurie Perry brought along chicken finger sandwiches.Since Laurie has pitched in when I've been behind schedule at many a party at my house--including the time I decided profiteroles were the way to serve coronation chicken salad--I was glad they arrived finished so she could enjoy herself.

Egg Salad Sandwiches

Melinda Snodgrass, who has not made it to any other meeting, gave us egg salad sandwiches, so I think we hit all of the major tea groups, sandwich wise.

Poached Pears in Red Wine

The Poached Pears in Wine which my sister made from the Will Torrent book were served on endive, with blue cheese and walnuts, and finished on a slice of dark bread. it was the kind of combination which really lifts the level of a tea to the heavens. Equally good were Liz's Fig and Ricotta Crisp Breads from the same book (one may be at about 4 o'clock in the picture of the over-filled plate, above.)

Tomato-Cheddar Cheese Tartlets

Mary DeLongis brought a huge platter of Tomato-Cheddar Tartlets down from the ranch. Because of the sliced tomato on each one, it occurred to me that it may be a recipe to repeat during peak tomato season later this year.

Salmon Salad

Kim Gottlieb-Walker made salmon salad and chopped chicken liver to eat on crackers. I think the chopped chicken liver is at the 8 o'clock position on my plate near the top of this page, and the salmon looks like it's at 2 o'clock.

Savories (Photography by Gillian Horvath)

I made Lobster Cheese Cakes. That's the cute little savory at the 9 o'clock position in the photograph above. I needed to buy cupcake trays with removable bottoms, which were actually easy to find on Amazon. The cheese cakes had a breadcrumb crust and the filling was made with lobster tale meat. What's not too like? The recipe made enough so that each of the expected number of guests could have one, and since a few people didn't make it, I got to eat the extras. My sister, who truly loves lobster, developed an allergy to crustaceans and is heartbroken when lobster, shrimp, or crayfish is on the menu. I ate hers. The recipe came from Teatime Holidays from 2015. The softcover collection from Tea Time Magazine has many wonderful recipes.

Available on Amazon.com

Sadly, I appear to have no pictures of the scones or sweets courses, although I think that may be Laurie's lemon curd in the upper left of Gillian's photo. This is a particular shame because Julia Roberts went to the trouble to actually make clotted cream for us. Julia said the most difficult thing about clotted cream is making sure some other member of the household doesn't try to turn off the oven during the twenty-four-hour cooking process! We had two kinds of scones, along with lemon curd and Black Forest jam to sample. Plus Gillian found a recipe for vegan clotted cream which she made and brought along for the lactose intolerant in the group.

Update: Kerry Glover did have a photograph of the cherry pie she made, although she did not have the cherry pie-lets that she made so everyone could get one.

Kerry Glover's Cherry Pie.

I am very glad that the Lenox dishes and flatware (except for the acrylic-handled serving pieces) and the glassware are all dishwasher safe. We were able to get the kitchen put away in good order without too much trouble.

Here are some other titles to consider when looking for tea recipes:

One of my favorite tea cook books is a self-published one from a tea shop that used to be in Carlsbad, California. Ticky-Boo Tea Room disappeared literally overnight. Fortunately, my friends had bought me the cook book when we first ate there. They served the best scones I had ever eaten until I went to Australia. I've posted the recipe before. Here it is again:

 Ticky-Boo Scones

2 C. All-purpose Flour
1 T. Baking Powder
1/2 tsp. Salt
1/3 C. Sweet Butter
1/4 C. Vegetable Shortening
1/3 C. Heavy Cream
Splash of Water

Place baking sheet in oven and preheat to 450 degrees F.
Sift the measured dry ingredients together, twice.
Dice fats into the dry ingredients, then lightly rub with cool fingertips or pastry blender. Make a well in center and stir in cream. Lightly mix with a fork until a soft dough forms. If dough is dry, add water, sprinkling a little at a time until the dough is perfect for kneading.
Turn out on a well-floured board and knead very lightly for about 1/2 minute for a loose smooth dough. Roll out with a rolling pin or pat with hands to approximately 3/4" thick.
Stamp out with a cutter or cut into triangles with a sharp knife. Knead together any trimmings and stamp out again, continuing until all the dough is used.
Lift with a spatula onto the preheated baking sheet, placing them 1" apart. Brush tops only with beaten egg or milk (optional--I don't.)
Bake toward the top of the oven for approximately 10-15 minutes or until well risen and golden brown. Remove and turn out onto a wire rack for cooling. Best served warm with clotted or Devon Cream and jam or curd.
This basic recipe may be adjusted to add currants, raisins, cheese with sage and walnuts, chocolate chips, dried fruit, or any other spice or variety you choose.

And here is the recipe from Helen Whitty's Fancy Pantry cook book for Lemon Curd that Laurie Perry made:

Enough ripe, fragrant, bright-skinned limes or lemons (about 3) to yield 1 T. of grated zest and 1/2 cup of strained juice
1/2 cup (1 stick) plus 2 T. unsalted butter, cut up
Pinch of salt
4 egg yolks
1 whole egg
1 1/4 C. sugar

1.  Run 2 inches of water into the base ban of a double boiler and set it over medium heat to come to a brisk simmer.
2.  Grate or shred enough zest from washed and dried limes or lemons to make 1 T. packed of the lime zest or 1-1/2 T packed lemon zest.
3.  Place the zest in the top pan of the double boiler. Add the strained juice to the pan. Drop the cut-up butter and the pinch of salt into the pan. Set aside.
4.  Beat the egg yolks and whole egg together at high speed in the large bowl of an electric mixer until they are foamy; gradually add the sugar, continuing to beat the mixture until it is pale, fluffy, and very thick, about 5 minutes.
5.  Scrape the egg mixture into the double-boiler top and set the top into the base containing simmering water. At once begin whisking the mixture; cook it, whisking it constantly until it has thickened smoothly and is steaming hot, about 10 minutes. Be careful not to overcook the curd; it is done when it will coat a metal or wooden spoon heavily (170 degrees on an instant read thermometer.)
6.  Pour the curd into a fine-meshed sieve set over a bowl and press it through with a rubber spatula, leaving the shreds of zest to be discarded. Scrape the curd into sterilized, dryjars, let cool uncovered, then cap the jars with sterilized lids. Refrigerate the curd.

Finally, a Triple Crown Party

The 2015 Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown Tea Party.

Since about 2002 or 2003, I've thrown a tea party to watch the Belmont Stakes. It's a great opportunity to get together with other women, play dress-up, and eat rich food. I did it for Smarty Jones, Big Brown, Mine that Bird, and California Chrome. This year, I got another chance when American Pharoah took the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes. I cancelled my plans for a whale watching trip and sent out invitations as soon as the results of the Preakness were finalized.

It's a mixed crowd: a few people from work, some TV writers, a few novelists, many of whom don't know each other except for this party. Altogether, it runs about two dozen people, some who come every time, some for whom it is the first time, some who have no interest in the horses at all, but all looking for a pleasant afternoon.

This year we had the added thrill of an actual Triple Crown winner when American Pharoah pulled five and a half lengths ahead of his nearest rival to cross the finish line.

Erin Maher took time from her busy schedule working on Scream to provide horse cookies.

I saw the great Secretariat win the Belmont in 1973 on a black and white TV. Ditto for Seattle Slew in 1977. I don't remember watching Affirmed in 1978. After so long a drought, I wasn't sure we'd ever see another horse pull it off. Now, we know it is still possible.

The menu for the tea varies from year to year. There are always scones, lemon curd, and when possible, Devon cream for which we pay dearly. I gave half a thought to trying to make it myself, but I decided to spring for the stuff in the refrigerator section of Gelson's instead. Lemon curd isn't that hard to make, but I've been lucky to have Susan Ellison make it for me in the past. This year, she couldn't make the party, but I found some so I could concentrate on making sure I got the Ticky-boo scones made. They were lovely as always.

Leek quiche and some cucumber, ham, and salmon tea sandwiches.

I made cucumber sandwiches, smoked salmon sandwiches, and ham and radish sandwiches. Then I had my sister make what Dani Dornfeld dubbed "T Sandwiches ala Chris," a stacked delight of a slice of baguette, mozzarella cheese, grilled eggplant, and tomato, with a bit of pesto between the layers. While I often make my own pesto, we used Costco's refrigerated basil pesto to save time.

T Sandwiches ala Chris on the lower left, along with some other selections of sandwiches and a Tia Maria cake.

My friend Susan Avallone brought her justifiably famous smoked turkey spread to be use on toast rounds. Karen Bailey brought two different kinds of stuffed eggs as well as some lovely tea sandwiches. Maria Rodriguez brought leek quiche and quiche Loraine. I was worried we'd be light on desserts, but I should not have been. Kim Gottlieb-Walker came through with her Tia Maria cake, a decadently deep chocolate confection best served with whipped cream.

Susan's smoked turkey spread in the lower part of the photograph.

There have been some cries that we need to do this every week. I'm not one of those calling for weekly teas because I'd be big as a house and totally stressed out if it was to be in my home. But once in a while, it's the very best way to spend a Saturday afternoon. And it is even better if a horse wins the Triple Crown.

Tea on Chatsworth

My girlfriend Gloria and her granddaughter, Seven, left Comic-con with me today to see a little bit of San Diego. We drove over to Del Coronado so they could get a look at the wonderful Hotel Del and we drove up to Balboa Park to see where the zoo is, even if we couldn't find parking at the Del or have time to see the pandas.We did get to go for tea at Tea-upon-Chatsworth, a darling shop over in Point Loma, across the bay from our hotels.

 Seven had never gone out for tea before today. We tried four teas, and the savories started with a red pepper soup and the sweets ended with a strawberry shortcake. Everything else is on the tower. It was tasty and about half the price of tea in L.A. these days.

 The soup.

 The savories.

 The menu for the Queen's Tea.

The teas we tried were a lavender infused Earl Grey, a vanilla flavored black tea, a white tea with a wine name, and a rooibos called Chocolate Cake. I'm taking four ounces of that loose tea home with me.

Tea Time

Planning a trip to San Diego for Comic-con always has me thinking about where I might go for tea during the week. This reminded me that I still had not written about the Belmont Tea I had in June.

The Belmont Tea goes back 10 or 12 years now, when I first started paying more attention to the Triple Crown than I had for a long time. I remember watching Secretariat and Seattle Slew each winning the Crown a mere three years apart, but there's a lot more attention paid to the Kentucky Derby most years, because the likelihood of one horse winning all three races is pretty small--the last time was in 1977, a year after Seattle Slew, by Affirmed.

None the less, there have been a number of years where a horse has one the first two races, signalling at least a pie in the sky hope that there could be a Triple Crown winner. And that's where the Belmont Tea comes from.

I am a native New Yorker, and I lived in New York for the first 23 years of my life. I was living in New York City when Secretariat won, so, with a horse up for the Triple Crown, I decided to host an afternoon tea to watch the Belmont Stakes. Girls only. Hats encouraged. So far, we have had disappointing races but pretty good food.

From left, Sharon, Kerry, Jess, Deb, Barbara, Betina, Laurie, Lorien, Erin, Maria, Maria, Mary, Liz.

California Chrome gave us the excuse this year, coupling the Belmont with my now 23 years as a California resident. It was the first Belmont Tea in the new house because the potential party was thwarted two years ago by scratching the winner of the Kentucky Derby and Preakness a day or two before the third race.

I encourage my guests to bring a dish and I try to do the basics of scones, lemon curd, and a variety of sandwiches, but the more other people bring, the less I have to make and the more I get to enjoy my own party. I'm also more than happy to welcome help in the kitchen when I need to finish up the prep, and this year was no exception. While I had made the chicken salad, sliced and salted the cucumbers, and boiled eggs for egg salad sandwiches, I was still putting sandwiches together when people arrived. In came the volunteers, and I found myself wondering for the umpteenth time how I ever was able to hold a party in the old house with its galley kitchen and lack of counter space.

I am grateful to Laurie Perry who brought Walnut and White Chocolate Scones, which were the hit of the party, since I never did get around to baking my recipe for plain scones. Susan Ellison, true Brit that she is, put the cucumber sandwiches together. Laurie pitched in and made the egg salad and then she and Barbara Hambly built egg salad sandwiches and the chicken salad sandwiches. Liz Mortensen made tomato and mozzerella sandwiches, and Kerry Glover brought tuna sandwiches. It takes a long time to trim crust from bread, but I am happy I can go to Bea's Bakery in Tarzana to get Pullman loaves of various kinds and get them sliced very thin.

My friend Lynn Latham scheduled a trip in from New Orleans to make it for the tea. She made her mother's pimento cheese sandwiches, a true Southern dish. Jess stuffed cucumbers with a spicy shrimp filling. Other friends brought fruit and cakes and we made 4 or 5 different kinds of tea, including a large dispenser of hibiscus iced tea.

Over the years, I've been collecting snack sets so people can have a dish with a place for their tea cups. I'm rather obsessed with them, actually. I have triangular milk glass snack sets for 30 people, as well as ones with floral decorations, and I recently picked up three which have horses on them! When looking for tea pots with horses, I found a beautiful set of dishes with Arabian horses, and shortly before the Belmont Tea I splurged and bought the tea pot, sugar bowl and creamer. So pretty. I found antique frosted Libby Tom Collins glasses with bounding horses a few years ago. They make great iced tea glasses. I also have found collector's glassware from a number of different years for the three races. They use the logo art for the particular year and usually have a list of all the winners of that race printed on the back. They all identify the horses that won the Triple Crown (and I've got one glass that lists only them.) Do you know how many horses have won the Triple Crown?* Can you name them?**

From left, Sharon, Deb, Barbara, Betina, Laurie, Lorien, Erin.

From left, Lorien, Erin, Maria, Maria, Mary, Liz, Kathryn, Lynn, Susan.

*Eleven horses have won the Triple Crown.

**Sir Barton, Galant Fox, Omaha, War Admiral, Whirlaway, Count Fleet, Assault, Citation, Secretariat, Seattle Slew, Affirmed. The only jockey to win the Triple Crown twice is Eddie Arcaro, on Whirlaway and Citation, both from owner/breeder Calumet Farm--the horses were trained, respectively, by Ben Jones and his son Horace Jones. The only other owner/breeder to win twice was Belair Stud with Galant Fox and Omaha--both trained by Jim Fitzsimmons.

No Barbie, but Lots of Good, Local Food

Len and I went to Australia in October. It was an amazing, though far too short, trip. And the food was fantastic.

The first day in, we searched out a restaurant that had been reviewed in a magazine article about Sydney's great eateries just before we left. It was literally down the street from where we stayed. It is called Cafe Nice and it is on the second floor of the building. If you don't look up, you'll miss it. We watched some buskers underneath the elevated train between us and the Harbor from our window seats. It was the only rainy weather of the trip.

The salad nicoise was recommended and it lived up to its reputation. That was our first experience of sticker shock--the minimum wage is $15 an hour, including for restaurants. Tipping is truly optional (although a line does show up on a credit card receipt.) Once you factor in the living wage, you realize this is a much better way to do things than in the U.S. and it turns out that breakfast and lunch may be more than you expect to pay in the U.S., but a nice dinner at a good restaurant isn't much different than here. When I think of my niece struggling to make ends meet between acting gigs, I think Australia has a better approach.

Our first night there, foolishly because of the travel and time differentials, we decided to take a dinner cruise around the harbor. We had a lovely time, but I was almost falling asleep on our table before it ended!  

The view of the Sydney Opera House from our dinner boat.

We had several meals, besides breakfast, at our hotel, mostly because we were too tired to go out anywhere else. It was actually a pretty good choice for dinner.

An amuse bouche of salmon with taragon at the hotel restaurant.

Oysters! 

I ate oysters every chance I got. They were local and they were delicious. And that's how I got a sea shell to bring back to my friend Sharon Baker at work.

Len ordered the charcuterie and onion soup because he didn't think he was very hungry. I did help him finish the platter, which was very pretty and really good.

Charcuterie.

Onion Soup.

I seem to eat a lot of duck when I eat out, probably because it's one of those things that Len refuses to eat and it is more effort than I will put into cooking for myself.

 Duck breast.

This duck breast was cooked perfectly, with a wine-reduction sauce, haricot vert, and potatoes. I'm pretty sure I staggered back to our room after dinner.

 I ate a lot of fish while I was in Australia, some which I had never eaten. John Dory was one I wanted to try, since Gordon Ramsey constantly has his chefs make it. Turns out that it is a white fish, not that different from some we have here, but very popular in Australia.

I did contemplate trying kangaroo, despite my general ban on red meat in my life. Unfortunately, the only place I saw it on a menu was as carpaccio, which I decided would not necessarily be a good start. So no 'roo this time.

We found a really good Chinese place near our hotel, where we ate after our excursion to the Blue Mountains. The plan had been to eat at a favorite restaurant of my friends' out there, but Len suddenly didn't feel well, so we went back to Sydney. The prices at the Chinese restaurant were higher than we'd expect to pay here, but the dishes were quite good and the staff attentive. Since we were in the financial district, it was very quiet on a weekday night.

I never did get to a proper tea, but my friend Sharyn and I stopped for some morning refreshment at a shop in this big Victorian building, filled with all kinds of interesting small shops. The scones were different from those I've eaten before. Tender, rather than flaky or dry. I picked up a small cookbook with tea recipes (books are also expensive) at the Museum of Sydney, so I hope a recipe in that replicates Australian scones.

Coffee was an experience. The Aussies take their coffee very seriously. Hugh Jackman is so serious about it that he opened a coffee shop in New York. I'm still not sure what a "flat white" is, because my drink of choice was chai, but poor Len could not get a coffee shop to produce a drink they way he likes it here. It was pretty funny. Coffee prices were remarkably similar to here, by the way. Starbucks is failing miserably over there, again because Aussies take their coffee seriously and they don't like "Charbucks."

High Tea

As anyone who has read this blog knows, I like to take tea whenever possible. I also enjoy putting on a tea, which I did for our annual Twelfth Night party in January. (My usual practice is to hold a tea on the day of the Belmont stakes, if there is a possibility of a Triple Crown winner. This has been remotely possible for years. The last one was Big Brown.)

I happened to notice that Chefs, Inc., a cooking school on the West Side of Los Angeles, was advertising a cooking class for a Mother's Day High Tea. I thought I might be able to pick up a few pointers--like how to get things done in advance so I can enjoy my guests--so I signed up to take the class with my son, who loves to bake. One of my "adopted daughters," Dani, who also likes to bake, decided to join us, so we were three of the five students in a class with two teachers. We had a blast and then we had a lovely high tea lunch.

The menu consisted of curried chicken tea sandwiches, above. The curried chicken was then used to fill profiteroles when we ran out of sandwich bread. I used curried chicken to fill profiteroles at my tea in January. Fortunately, I had a kitchen full of volunteers that day, because a tea is last-minute labor-intensive, and more suited to a small party than a large one. The profiteroles are in the second photo, above.

We made two different kinds of crepes for the class. Fortunately, for future parties, both can be made in advance of the party. The egg crepes, above, were essentially very thin fried herb omelets that were then filled with creme fresh and slices of smoked salmon and folded into quarters. They can be refrigerated and brought back to room temperature for serving.

We also made flour crepes that were filled with spinach and bechamel sauce and then baked. Everyone took turns at making the crepes and all of us got an opportunity to improve our ability to flip them over without them landing on the floor. It gave me a great feeling of accomplishment.

No tea party is complete without scones. If you've read this blog for a while, you know that I got a great scone recipe from the long-gone Ticky-boo Tea Shoppe in Carlsbad about 10 or 11 years ago. But the ones we made on Saturday with dried cranberries were quite nice. No Devon or clotted cream was served, unfortunately.

Another entry on the dessert side of the ledger were individual cream cheese cakes. They were so easy, using a 'Nilla Wafer for the bottom crust and topped with cherry pie filling or jam (two above were reserved for my son, who cares for neither cherry filling nor jams.)

We also made a beautiful bacon and mushroom quiche, which I plan to make for the Sunday Super Supper Squad one of these days. It was amazing.

The small classroom size was a plus in being able to work on all the parts of the tea, but there was a lot of food left over. Cooking classes are no longer permitted to send leftovers home because of perceived liability issues if the participants fail to store food properly and then get sick. The instructor told us they keep the food for their staff to eat, but I'm surprised that the staff doesn't look overweight. This was a pretty rich menu.

The photographs above were all made with a Nikon Coolpix S8000 shooting available light with no flash at an ISO of 100 at the highest jpeg quality and auto white balance. The images were then run through Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4 for some minor cropping and image adjustment, as well as watermarking. The S8000 is my carry-everywhere digital camera. I just wish it could shoot RAW.

Taking Tea

I am so far behind writing this blog. I've got several drafts waiting to be finished. Photographs have backed up as I made a decision about whether to move up to Lightroom 3, and, suddenly, Lightroom 4 appeared. Once I got all my images moved into the new library and figured out the basics, I am left with no excuses to procrastinate.

Between Christmas and New Years, Susan Ellison, Kathryn Drennan and I headed out for tea and shopping in Beverly Hills. We seem to do this every year about this time, because I usually take that week off from work. Most of the time, we have to look for tea shops that are open on Saturday or Sunday.

This year, we gave tea at the Montrose Hotel a try. The hotel also houses a Thomas Keller L.A. restaurant, Bouchon, but it doesn't appear that they cross-over (I did get to eat some finger food from there in December, at a Case Western Reserve University School of Law reception, but I didn't use my camera.)

I thought the hand-painted china was quite pretty (and so was the cost of a set in the gift shop.) The tea was very nice, though perhaps not as accommodating as the one we go to at the Peninsula Hotel in another part of Beverly Hills (we like more control over the choices of food.) The service was good, surroundings were lovely,  and the post-Christmas shopping afterwards was fun.