Paulding & Company
Team building, cooking events, catering, parties, and classes in the San Francisco Bay Area

Sample Menus for Cooking Parties

Menus from a thousand past events and classes swirl through my head! Your event is special and deserves a menu that is special to you, one that takes your tastes and desires into account. Draw inspiration from the menus listed here, and let us design a special menu for your special event!

The Bounty of the Sea

This menu was made with a corporate group of about 20 true seafood lovers. They wanted to have some in every dish except dessert. We created a buffet that fit their expectations,  and then added a favorite summer dessert. They loved it, and just brought back some of their clients for some winter fun in the kitchen. 

  • Artichoke conserve with crudo of day boat scallops
  • Mussels cooked with leeks and wine
  • Salade Niçoise, with seared sushi-grade tuna
  • Salmon paillard, with cilantro lime butter and spiced cous-cous
  • Blueberry tart with creme fraiche ice cream

Middle Eastern Party Menu

It was winter, stormy, and cold. We warmed the kitchen making this meal with a group of around 30 guests; we've also used the menu for a catered party. Fresh and delicious, with plenty of variety, it was a big hit with both groups. Dessert with this meal could be almost anything--we added a few suggestions at the end. 

Appetizers

  • Mini chicken b’stillas
  • Yogurt-spinach dip, with homemade pita chips and fresh vegetables
  • Zucchini and feta cheese fritters, drizzled with yogurt garlic sauce

Dinner Buffet

  • Green salad with blood oranges, mandarins, and caramelized almonds
  • Moroccan carrot salad
  • Middle eastern beet salad
  • Warmed naan
  • Roast spice-crusted leg of free-range lamb, carved and served with a pomegranate jus
  • Yam, red bell pepper, and green bean tagine
  • Baklava or a filo pastry, custard and fruit Napoleon, or pistachio torte with fresh fruit and sabayon, or fresh fruit strudel

Paella Party

Tapas and Paella are wonderful, flavorful, and exciting foods. This was a rehearsal dinner menu for a group of about 50 people. So, we had many hands involved in making the food. We used our biggest paella pan, which more than covers the big stock pot stove, and made sure we had plenty of other delicious dishes to nibble with sangria while it cooked. To make this meal for a catered event off-site, we'd have to rent a paella ring, a handy contraption that hooks up to a gas bottle, or do it over a Weber. 

  • Brandada de Bacala (Salt cod and potato, served bubbling hot with toasts)
  • Espárragos Aliñados Envueltos en Jamon (Asparagus wrapped in Serrano ham, marinated)
  • Garbanzos con Espinacas (Chickpeas with spinach)
  • Manchego y Membrillo (Manchego cheese with quince paste)
  • Pimentos picantes (Spicy grilled peppers)
  • Tarta de Hongos (Mushroom tart)
  • Ensalada de Berengena (Eggplant salad)
  • Paella Valenciana (With shellfish, chicken and pork)
  • Tarta de Santiago, with pear brandy sauce and sabayon 

Small Plates for a Large Group

We have groups large and small in the kitchen, and always work to make the event exciting. Here, we set up for a cocktail party rather than a seated meal, and created a stunning tapas menu for this 85-person group. We also worked to incorporate the client's desire to have lots of 'retro' dishes on the menu, and accommodate both the CEO's desire for a gluten-free dessert, as well as making everyone's favorite pick.

  • Beef Wellington bouchees and vegetarian wild mushroom bouchees
  • Roasted butternut squash with chestnuts and kale
  • Tuna confit and cannellini bean salad
  • Cauliflower with preserved lemon and olives
  • Crab-stuffed celery stalks
  • Deviled eggs with boquerones garnish
  • Chicken skewers with chimichurri sauce
  • Dates stuffed with almonds and blue cheese, wrapped in pancetta and roasted
  • Fennel and citrus salad
  • Clams cooked with garlic and smoked paprika (pimenton)
  • Gougeres filled with tequila lime shrimp salad
  • Snap pea salad with mint and feta cheese
  • Garlic, sherry and honey roasted baby back ribs
  • Piquillo peppers stuffed with goat cheese and roasted
  • Patatas bravas with Allioli
  • Pound cake with ice cream and Valrhona chocolate sauce
  • Mango panna cotta

Visiting Italy

Celebrating the flavors of Italy, this group was excited to use our homemade ricotta in some fabulously light and delicious gnocchi. We took a side-trip to teach them all how to make the ricotta, something I learned from our Calabrian cooking teacher, Rosetta Costantino and her mom, Maria Dito. You can't use the newly made ricotta in gnocchi as it's very wet, and you'd need too much flour, making dense, heavy gnocchi. So, we just had a tasting of the new cheese, and made our tender gnocchi with a batch I'd allowed to drain for a few days. 

The menu started with a favorite salad, showcasing local wild mushrooms and greens from the farmer's market. We grow most of the herbs we tossed in, in our little sidewalk herb garden. Polpettone by any other name is meatloaf; I am always reminded of a meal in southern France, where my husband, intrigued by the menu item of Pate Chaud, ordered it and got—you guessed it—meatloaf. It was delicious then, and the one we make, mixing in sauteed mushrooms and shallots, and wrapping it in pancetta, is delicious too. 

  • Salad with wild mushrooms and walnuts
  • Ricotta spinach gnocchi with brown butter and cheese
  • Polpettone with tomato-laced pan sauce
  • Roasted vegetables, balsamico, extra virgin olive oil, and fresh herbs
  • Zabaglione with berries

Classic Favorites

What are the secrets to making a great onion soup? Like I used to tell my students, this is not rocket science—it's pretty easy but takes some patience. While the onions are cooking, we'll make the best homemade tuna confit you've ever tasted, or if you prefer your fish seared and served rare, we can do that too, but the classic Nicoise salad is always a winner. And, we pair it with one of our favorite desserts, featuring Valrhona chocolate, of course.

This menu is good any season; we'll garnish the dessert differently in June than January, of course. It will work for a catered lunch, or a smaller group team building event, or a cooking party where you want plenty of time for other activities besides cooking. 

  • French onion soup
  • Classic salade Nicoise, with fresh tuna confit (and/or) seared sashimi-grade tuna
  • Fallen chocolate souffle torte, whipped cream and seasonal garnish

Cooking Party in Winter

A group of friends have come back to the kitchen three times to celebrate birthdays over the course of several years. They love the cooking event experience, and each one adds a personal flavor to the mix. The latest, in January, included signature cocktails, and an amazing array of memorabilia about the birthday guy--plus a full-size cardboard cut-out, dressed in a spiffy pinstriped suit. The experience was again a success; we honed in on exactly the right menu for the birthday guy. Afterwards, I got this note from one of the guests:

"It was great to see you and to be a part of another Birthday celebration at your school last Saturday.  As usual, the food prep was fun and a great learning experience and of course the end result was a wonderful dinner with friends. 

"Although my first experience at your school was nearly three years ago for my own surprise birthday dinner, it remains one of my fondest memories.  I can still get a sense of the flavors and aromas of the awesome Osso Bucco, gnocci and other pairings that we prepared that night.  It is a great way to share time with friends and family and really get to know each other on a different level - in the kitchen!  The energy of you and your staff brings out the best in us to be creative and curious about what comes next. Thanks again for another wonderful evening and I look forward to another time." David G
 

Appetizers

  • Spinach & sun dried tomato frittata with red pepper coulis
  • Dungeness crab stuffed mushrooms

Dinner

  • Winter salad with pomegranate vinaigrette, with puff pastry pear & blue cheese tarts
  • Salmon poached in court bullion with caper lemon butter
  • Roasted baby root vegetables
  • Bananas in caramel rum sauce with group-made coconut ice cream

Summer In The Kitchen

A tailored salad, savory and satisfying. Elegant and healthy salmon, paired with super-fast side dishes that compliment it perfecly. Not too much time spent over the stove on a hot day, but a delidious entree nevertheless. An easy, buttery pie crust folded around fresh summer fruits, and to top it all off, some silky ice cream that will start to melt into the still-warm tarts. Getting hungry yet?

  • Arugula with shaved parmesan and crispy pancetta
  • Pan-roasted salmon paillard with cilantro butter over spiced cous-cous
  • Stir-fried peapods and cherry tomatoes
  • Summer fruit tarts with homemade vanilla ice cream

Harvest Menu

The days are getting shorter, and the apples are crisp. Wild chanterelles pop up under the forest live oaks, and we love them with pork. We make a magical dish, a tournedo that laces together pork tenderloins, wraps them in pancetta and then sears them and serves with a delicious pan sauce with the wild mushrooms. This menu is a crowd-pleaser, every course fragrant and brightly flavored. Learn how to cook these dishes, or let us cater your special event with this menu—the rehearsal dinner before an autumn wedding, perhaps?

  • Carrot soup with pesto croutons
  • Pork tenderloin tournedoes with pancetta and wild mushrooms, served with creamy polenta and sauteed spinach
  • Apple strudel with Calvados sabayon

Autumn or Spring Menu

Pairing the last of the fall (or first of the spring) peas with their geographical cousins, the artichoke—what could be better? With some creamy, newly-dug fingerling potatoes, the mixture becomes the base for a delicious fish, all of it enhanced by the buttery sauce. Meyer lemons from my trees make a delicious tart to end the meal; the soup that starts dinner can be made with chicken broth or vegetarian, so this is a great menu for pescitarians. 

  • Creamy cauliflower soup with tapanade toasts
  • Seared and roasted market fish, with Champagne buerre blanc
  • Crispy artichokes, English peas and fingerling potatoes
  • Lemon tart

Warming Winter Menu

When the wind is blowing and the rain coming down, you need to start with something warming. Our soup takes advantage of two of the best winter ingredients, escarole and leeks, which are at their height in the blustery middle of winter. The entree salad is composed of three parts, spicy arugula, seductively flavorful wild rice, and duck—if you've never cooked duck, this is the perfect introduction; if you already love it, maybe this is a new way to make it that is both easy and delicious. Our pistachio torte recipe evolves every time we make it. Here, we pair it with roasted pears, and pear cider sabayon that incorporates the roasting juices. We'll teach you how to make this menu, or, if you want a cosy place to conduct a meeting or symposium, we'll cater the meal as a delicious lunch, right in our kitchen.

  • Escarole, leek and rice soup, with homemade chicken broth
  • Arugula salad with braised and roasted duck legs over cranberry and pecan wild rice
  • Pistachio torte with pears and pear sabayon

Asian Favorites

We love to make food from different cultures that go together well. The spring rolls are made with non-traditional ingredients, like beets, jicama, and snow peas. The Indonesian peanut sauce is savory and delicous, served with a variety of seasonal farmer's market vegetables, and the chicken is one of our favorite spicy recipes, the only non-vegetarian dish on the menu. These fresh and vibrant dishes are finished with a delicious dessert that includes a lesson in ice cream making. This menu would work for any group event, from a corporate team buildling session to a party.

  • Fresh vegetable spring rolls, with dipping sauce
  • Gado-gado (Indonesian peanut sauce) with vegetables
  • Indonesian marinated roast chicken
  • Mee Goring (stir-fried noodles and vegetables)
  • Coconut ice cream with caramel bananas

Vegetarian Cooking Party in March

Yes, we do all-vegetarian menus. This one was created for a group of a dozen college friends who pick a different place to meet each year, and spend time catching up and enjoying a few days away from their routine. The host decided a cooking lesson would be a great activity, and provide her guests with something valuable to bring home to their families afterwards. They wanted a cocktail hour, so we started off with some simple cocktail-friendly catered hors d'oeuvres, and then they cooked a hearty meal together. The torta is a favorite menu item, with a stretched dough not unlike a very thin pasta, and a savory and hearty filling.

Pre-made hors d'oeuvres

  • Fava bean and pecorino crostini with mint
  • Spicy popcorn
  • Manchego cheese with membrillo (quince paste)

Group-made dinner

  • Citrus and chicories salad with roasted beets and blood orange vinaigrette
  • Torta verde, with chard, potatoes,  and feta
  • Butternut squash roasted with chestnuts, herb dressing
  • Panna cotta with caramelized pomelo 

Midsummer Fun

This menu was for a cooking party, a family reunion with four generations in the kitchen. They wanted to play and have fun and visit, and make a menu that the kids and young adults could work on while the older group watched and visited with one another. We kept it classic American--the family was Chinese-American, and that was exactly what they wanted. The kids had so much fun, and the meal they made was delicious. Everyone went home happy.

  • Green salad with grilled calamari
  • Oven-fried chicken
  • New potato salad
  • New York style cole slaw
  • Homemade ice cream sandwiches (chocolate cookies, homemade vanilla ice cream)

Fantastic in February

In late winter, the artichokes are kissed with frost and as sweet as they can be, and the Satsuma mandarins, used whole in the light-as-air soufflés, are at their peak at the farmer's market. The soup is hearty and magically delicious, one of those dishes that comes together at the end to be far greater than the sum of its parts, and making pizza is just plain fun—you can let everyone top their own, to their liking. 

The menu works with groups of all sizes, from six to sixty!

  • Artichokes with aioli
  • Turkish style chicken soup with leeks and mint
  • Pizza
  • Tangerine soufflés, creme Anglaise

Spring Asparagus and Blueberries

Our menus change with the micro-seasons. We try to serve what is at it's peak of perfection, and buy most of our produce at the farmer's markets. This menu was created for a cooking party, but would work for team building events and catered affairs, too. We'll even cater the party in our kitchen—ask us about transforming the space into your own private banquet hall!

  • Warm Delta asparagus salad with truffle oil
  • Roast rack of lamb, Provençale
  • Gratin of potatoes and fennel with wild mushrooms
  • Sautéed snap peas and spring carrots with garden mint
  • Blueberry tart with buttermilk sorbet

Trip to France, Cherry Season

Remember quiche? Years ago, it was very trendy. It hasn't gotten any less delicious over time, and we revived it for this menu, which we made as lunch with a team building group. Warm clafoutis is one of the most delicious desserts ever invented, and if you don't believe me, look at the picture on the main menus page for proof. 

  • Salade de betteraves et roquette avec Roquefort (Roasted baby beets and arugula with Roquefort cheese and a light vinaigrette)
  • Moules aux Poireaux (Mussels, sautéed with leeks, garlic, fresh tomato and white wine)
  • Quiche Lorraine or Tarte d’asperge et chevre (A classic Quiche, with bacon and Emmenthaler cheese, or a vegetarian version with fresh asparagus and goat cheese)
  • Clafoutis de cerise, glace de vanille (Bing cherries and almonds baked in a custardy batter, with homemade vanilla ice cream and cherry sauce)