A weekend's worth of recipes!

Our great friends threw us a luau shower over the weekend (stay tuned for pictures) and we had lots of family in town to celebrate with us. I made lots of yummy things to have on hand for our visitors including classic chocolate chip cookies, salsa, sonoma chicken salad (I actually swapped out 2/3 of the mayo and used low-fat greek yogurt to decrease the fat content), pancetta and green onion tart and finally buttermilk cheddar biscuits made mini-style.








Ok - that sounds (and looks) like a lot. But I planned ahead and got to spend lots of time with the fam while having a kitchen full of goodies. I prepared the cookie dough the weekend before, rolled it into an easily sliceable log and froze it. Thursday night, I sliced the dough into about 3 dozen cookies and baked them. I also made the salsa Thursday night. Saturday morning before our company arrived, I chopped and crisped the pancetta, chopped green onions, grated cheese for both the tart and biscuits and chopped the butter for biscuits. I put all that back in the fridge (all measured and ready to go!) All that planning made Sunday morning much easier on me. I woke up and was able make a great brunch for me and Mike; my parents, sister and her boyfriend; my grandparents; my aunt, cousin and baby G; and Mike's mom and 2 sisters! We definitely had a full house!

Thanks to everyone for coming to visit and making the shower special!