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© 2007 Dan Perlman
Casa SaltShaker
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Chef: Dan Perlman
Host: Henry Tapia
March 10, 2007
Now, to the tomato. There are a couple of types of dinners that are my favorite to prepare. My true favorite - more for a group of friends than for a planned dinner, is a sort of mystery basket dinner. Everyone brings a couple of ingredients and I have to figure out a couple of things to make from them. I’ve done those a few times - usually with a couple of other chef friends - and we just have fun playing in the kitchen - it’s sort of our version of the Iron Chef challenge - to each other. My next most favorite is the one ingredient menu. Not that there’s only one ingredient in each dish or something, but that there’s a central ingredient that’s used in every dish - we did that here at Casa S for our chocolate dinner and our champagne dinner. What’s fun for me is that I get to think about that ingredient in ways that I might not have before, and also to get to present it, and have others start thinking about it in ways that they never have. Needless to say, some of our guests for this last weekend seemed nervous about the idea of an “all tomato” dinner. I think that we pulled it off…
Comment from some of our guests:
"I just wanted to tell you what a wonderful evening we had at Casa Saltshaker last Saturday night. The food was sensational, the wines excellent and the company interesting and fun!! Every one of the tomato dishes was so tasty and unique. I never would have believed what could be done to such a familiar part of our diet! I 'd love to make the "Smoky Tomato Cheese Tart" Let me know when you put out a cook book with your creative cooking recipes. Thanks for a memorable evening." - B.K.
"Just a quick note to say thanks to you and Henry for a lovely evening! The dinner was great and the conversation a joy... We do hope to stop by again some time for another evening of interesting food and company." - C.C.
