DJ's Party House

The day finally came.

The eve of Lantern Festival.  The second-last day of Chinese New Year. The day we opened our home to welcome close friends and have a real Chinese New Year celebration after a decade of not celebrating on a grand scale!!

We wanted the whole shebang - a feast of traditional Malaysian Chinese New Year food, just like the ones my mum during CNY back home, CNY cakes and cookies, red packets with "lucky" money,

mandarin oranges,  red lanterns, red flowers and red tassle-y thingies

                                     

complete with really corny yet highly entertaining party activity like karoake! Are you groaning at the word karaoke? I could almost hear the shudders.......When we first told a friend that we'd have karoake-singing at the party, he immediately "developed" laryngitis. All but one friend couldn't attend and looking back, we're wondering now if he was simply just terrified at karaoke? As popular as karaoke is in the Eastern culture - the classic happy-hour activity in Japan (have you seen how the working class in Japan unwind after a hard day's work) - karaoke hasn't really taken off in the Western world. After all, it's easier to sit back, play Simon Cowell and critique American Idol contestants from the comforts of our couches, rather than make ridiculous fools out of ourselves by karaoking from the same! So we thought we'd infuse our party not only with Asian food and theme, but go all the way with our little import of "Asian karaoke culture" as well! Boy, it was a fun night! All the hard work paid off and our guests enjoyed themselves thoroughly as did we. I mean, how could you put a price on this: watching your friends make a fool out of themselves, belting out while simultaneously butchering great hits by Aretha Franklin, Louis Armstrong, Sting, Van Morisson, etc. beyond recognition?!? 

D and I practically labored a whole week to prepare for the party, well, actually I labored the whole week while D helped in the evenings. There were spices to prepare in advance. Poultry and meat that had to be marinated overnight. Crispy-crunchy yummy appetizer that required prep-ahead work. Desserts to be baked. Serving platters to be matched, flowers to be arranged and color-coordinated with the rest of the themed decorations that needed to be put up as well.

I even started a planning log just so that we stay on track, avoid things falling through the crack, down to the minute yet important details like making sure we have fresh rolls of toilet paper in the restroom and fresh paper towels for guests! And even a timeslot to replace air fresheners throughout the house! That's how I usually handle every single project at work, so it makes perfect sense to follow the same rigor for our own projects at home, no? You may have realized by now that I have a disorder.........

The appetizer was a huge hit! None of our friends have had Pie Tee and simply loved the crunchy pop-in-your-mouth treat with a burst of wonderful flavors. D and I tag-teamed and  fried up ~ 100+ of these mini shells. I also made my special satay sauce to go with the pie tees. Our guests were so intrigued by the way we served the Pie Tees; the ooohs and the ahhs that filled the room when we revealed those dainty little cups, then used chopsticks to carefully place the trio of vege (shredded jicama, carrots and cucumber) into the shells and served on a flat Oriental platter.

The pièce de résistance was my Beef Rendang. Perhaps I've made that so many times that it became "just another dish" for me but our guests just couldn't stop raving over how great the rendang was! Soft, fork-tender beef after its been slowly braised in blend of aromatic spices and coconut milk for hours.

We also served Malaysian Curry Chicken - yet another slow-cooked dish with loads of Malaysian spices and simply scrumptious gravy that went excellently well with our coconut rice (white rice cooked in coconut milk and aromatic pandanus leaf).

There were so many things going on that we had forgotten to take pictures of the other dishes. Other entrées served that evening, all buffet-style:
Char Kway Teow (Malaysian Stir-fried Flat Rice Noodles)
Chinese Roast Duck
Chinese BBQ Pork
Chinese Five-spiced Roasted Chicken

I had a dessert spread, pretty much like how I've always wanted (I've been dreaming about a dessert-only party; one of these days, maybe....).

Pineapple Rolls

















Fried Nutella Wontons - a great hit!!

Sugee (Coarse Semolina) Cake with Raisins & Winter melon candy

Plain and Raspberry Meringue Chantillies with Roasted Berries

I must admit, I can still feel a wave of exhaustion typing all this. Nonetheless, all the efforts were well worth it. Good food, good ambience, great company and even better, excellent entertainment! We now have in our possession top-notch blackmail materials!!  Don't believe me? Listen for yourself! Be warned - it does have that "killing me softly" effect!

One of our most memorable CNY celebration in a while......and you've guessed it - I'm still haunted by the karaoke voices.......