weekend guests - food ideas?

[Anonymous]

We have some family coming to visit this weekend. We usually eat out with company, but I'd like to try to cook some simple meals this time so we get some more quality time together (4 adults and 6 kids in a restaurant typically equals lots of noise and little actual conversation, if you know what I mean). Please recommend any dinner ideas that fit the situation - easy, kid and adult friendly, and if possible ones I can pre-prep as much as possible so that I can spend time with our guests. Thank you for your ideas!

[Anonymous]

Meatball subs
Lasagna
Make your own tacos/burritos/fajitas
BBQ done in the crockpot
Spaghetti

[Anonymous]

Make lasagna and freeze it. You can even make it the day before and just put in the fridge. You could do tacos- really easy, put stuff out and people make their own. You could even have tomatoes chopped, cheese shredded, etc. beforehand.

[Anonymous]

Chilli.
Kabobs/hummus/pita/rice (take out from Moby Dick.)
Make your own piazza/salad/sundae bar.
Hearty soup and salad w/ good bread.
Chicken pot pies.
Quiche.
Eggplant/Chicken Parmesan.
Ravioli or tortellini or ziti
W/ meatballs.
Burger/hotdog/fries.
Baked potato bar (w/ chilling/ broccolli/cheese/bacon bits.

[Anonymous]

*chilling/chilli

[Anonymous]

Moussska & Greek salad w/ spanokopita.

[Anonymous]

Hot dog bar! One of the toppings could be chili. make a lot of it so those who don't want hot dogs can have it as their main course.

[Anonymous]

Grownup meal that kids will eat too: Chicken Marbella. (originally from Silver Palate cookbook, but it's all over the internet. Google it.)
Super easy--chicken thighs, ton of garlic, ton of olives, it bakes in the oven. Serve with rice or noodles.

[Anonymous]

It's going to be cold, how about making a HUGE pot of soup. Just throw some chopped carrots about 5or6, two onions diced, two or three pieces of garlic, a potato chopped up. Drizzle some olive oil and let all of this saute together for a about 10 minutes while stirring. Add some chicken broth, let this cook for about 15 minutes; --- while this is cooking chop up some spinach, a little bit more onion, a carrot or two. After you blend or immersion blend all the indredients that were cooking, throw in the chopped up carrots, etc and let it simmer for about 30-40 minutes and you have soup for the weekend. Forgot to add at anytime you see the liquid disappear you will need to add some water or more chicken broth.

Also, you may add some butternut squash too and blend it all up it's delish! Salt and pepper to taste.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Grownup meal that kids will eat too: Chicken Marbella. (originally from Silver Palate cookbook, but it's all over the internet. Google it.)
Super easy--chicken thighs, ton of garlic, ton of olives, it bakes in the oven. Serve with rice or noodles.

My kids would not eat that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grownup meal that kids will eat too: Chicken Marbella. (originally from Silver Palate cookbook, but it's all over the internet. Google it.)
Super easy--chicken thighs, ton of garlic, ton of olives, it bakes in the oven. Serve with rice or noodles.

My kids would not eat that.

dito, no chance my kids would eat that

[Anonymous]

I often make mac and beef for something like this.

This makes one big crock pot of food. If you have a smaller crock pot, decrease proportionally. Make one pound al dente macaroni of choice (shells, rotini, penne, elbows, etc all work--we use whole wheat, but you can use regular). Saute one medium chopped onion and minced garlic (to taste, I use about 3-4 cloves) in some olive oil. Add one pound ground meat of choice (sometimes ground turkey, sometimes ground beef and occasionally ground bison) and brown. Put pasta, ground meat, basil and oregano, one 29 oz can of tomato sauce and one 12 oz can of tomato paste and 1-2 cups of grated parmesan or romano cheese into crock pot. Stir and let cook together until warm. If it gets dry, you can add a little water to loosen it up.

I have often made it up the night before and tossed it into a large tupperware. On the day I need it, I dump the tupperware into the crock pot about 2-4 hours before I need it and let it cook.

Works great for adults and children and easy to serve.

[Anonymous]

takeout from Moby Dick worked great for us. Otherwise when we get together it's usually something like pizza, spaghetti, hot dogs/burgers....

[Anonymous]

dito, no chance my kids would eat that

Bummer. I've been at several parties where kids of a variety of ages totally chowed down on it. DS has loved it since he was 3. You can also put some in a separate cooking dish for little ones, and ease up a little on the garlic a bit.

But hey--that's why the world has lots of options. I liked the hot dog bar idea too. Or mac and cheese--who doesn't like that? If you make it homemade, you can do it all in advance and just pop in the oven.

[Anonymous]

I love chicken marbella!