Today Mr. Adam Zewe of the Community News came to interview Steve and Lisa about what Our Silver Platter is really all about and what Steve and Lisa really do on a day-to-day basis.

The article won’t appear until next week but we all wanted to thank Mr. Zewe for taking the time to come speak with us. We will post a link next week when it is published but in the meantime catch up on what else Mr. Zewe and the rest of the staff of

The Community News are reporting on in the world.

           The Wall Street Journal published an article recently called Hosting an Outdoor Party based on the advice of Chef Alain Ducasse of New York and Paris.  Although the article was mainly about the hosting style of the famous chef it also brought up a point that we are often trying to make here at OSP.

            He states that if he has a party larger than 12 that he always makes sure to hire staff because, “running around making sure they drink and eat is not how we want to be spending our time.”

            Our point is exactly that. When it is just a small group of friends it is intimate and no outside help is needed. But when the number of people starts to grow, often so does the host's stress level.  Hiring even just one person to help serve food or drinks can make a world of difference.

Especially if you are prone to being stressed out. Accepting help is not just ok your guests might actually prefer it because if they can see that you’re not having fun, they won’t be able to either. And since that isn't exactly the spirit of shindigs and celebrations the world over, don't be afraid to ask for help.

            As I’ve said before the internet is a magical place. If you happen to accidentally Google the wrong thing sometimes what you end up finding is so much more fun than what you originally wanted. Getting lost online is much better than getting lost in the woods.

Lisa was online looking for a recipe recently and came across the blog Café Lynnylu during her search. She came across it because it had the recipe she wanted for Baba au Rhum. It was already going so well.

However once she was there she discovered that it not only had the recipe she wanted but that it was fun and had beautiful food photos to boot. And you know that we enjoy lovely food pictures almost as much as real food here so of course we wanted to post about it.

            The blog features a ton of great recipes and pictures as well as fun facts and little histories of the foods and recipes. It’s definitely worth checking out if you like food and the internet combined into one entity. 

            There are a lot of websites dedicated to weddings and brides out there. I won’t attempt to count for you as I’m sure they might rival the number of stars in existence and no one here really has that kind of time today. However I can focus on one in particular that I think does a really wonderful job at being both aesthetically pleasing as well as helpful.

            Or I suppose I should say there are two websites to be correct.  The Brides Cafe was created by Janie Medley, a floral designer for weddings and events and she recently created a newer more photo-friendly site to accompany the original blog.

            To see more photos as well as links to the photographers who took them visit her newer page for The Brides Cafe. There you can view extensive photos of weddings and all the trappings that go with them.

            Last week Steve and I had lunch right down the road at the Centreville Cafe with a friend of his, Mr. Eric Brinsfield, who also happens to own the Kitchen & Company stores on the east coast. They are lovely giant stores full of hard to find foods and ingredients, ways to make food and hard to find ingredients, and ways to serve it.

            Or as Mr. Brinsfield more eloquently puts it his stores are for everything from preparing food to serving and entertaining. You can create an entire dinner party from this store and not just the dinner. This is what really distinguishes it from other kitchen stores. It really is a one stop shop for anything remotely food, drink, or entertaining related.

            I managed to sneak away to the closest Kitchen and Co. Store after our talk to take some pictures of fun food things and to buy some pearl sugar.  We’ll get into why I needed the pearl sugar in a later post but it involves something delicious of course.

            There are 5 locations for Kitchen and Co. and the one I visited was in Christiana Delaware. The manager and the rest of the staff of the store were extremely nice to me even though I’m sure I looked strange taking photographs all over the place for an hour.

            They were nice enough to let me play around in their test/demonstration kitchen for a while where they also offer cooking classes for adults and for kids.  Check the website to find the store nearest to you and the schedule of classes and events.

            The store is immense and has everything you could possibly be looking for and a million other items you might not have known about as well.  This is just one section of a wall of kitchen utensils that seemed to span at least a football field to me.

            But for all of the vast selection Kitchen and Co. and Mr. Brinsfield's other Reading China and Glass stores offer,  both manage to keep the prices very low.  It is very easy to walk in the store, find what you’re looking for, and not break your wallet.

           They have row upon row of all sorts of glassware often for just a dollar a glass.

            So whether you need to buy extra for a party or you are just trying to furnish a new home they will have plenty of whatever it is that you seek.

Visit

www.thekitchenstore.com

www.centrevillecafe.com