6:10pm: I arrive at Trader Joe’s in Union Square. Usually for a big dinner, I like to get the groceries a day or two before but unfortunately I had been too busy earlier in the week so I left grocery shopping till the last minute. I am also late getting to the grocery store because of work and life so basically, I am completely off schedule for this planned dinner party of 9 that starts at 7:30pm that I am hosting. I plan the menu accordingly and get things I can cook rather quickly and buy some appetizers. People really only need wine & bread to survive.* I think this obsession with hosting dinners started in middle school when I organized a mostly historically accurate menu for a“last dinner on the titanic” party for my 8th grade class. I literally have no recollection why this was something my grade was doing or who thought of this event but I went to a really weird arts school in rural Delaware and we did totally random nonsense all the time. What teacher today says to themselves, “sure let’s let 13 year olds organize a fancy themed dinner (which we eat during lunch time) and then let them see who can hold their hand in a bucket of freezing ice water the longest…it’s educational!” ? But I guess I did learn important life skills like make a Bûche De Noël from scratch and that white bread was only for the upper class.

6:11pm: Grocery shopping in the city is extra stressful because you also have to schlep everything back to your apartment. I really miss having a car. The Trader Joe’s in Union Square is intense; its super small. There is always a line out the door & the clientele ranges from neurotic to insane. If you are actually going to the grocery store yourself (not ordering seamless) and you went to Trader Joe’s you probably really want to save some money. People who go out of their way to save money in small amounts are usually a bit eccentric, which is a nice word for batshit crazy, like couponers, or the people who buy storage sheds to make money. Also 6:00pm-7:00pm is the worst time to go grocery shopping because it’s the people who just got off work, are hungry, are probably gonna have to cook these groceries for dinner tonight and are just pissed off at the world. I see people all the time walk into this Trader Joe’s, see the place, and then with horror, just turn and walk out. NYC is the only place, besides maybe communist Russia and a dystopian future where people would wait in line to GET INTO a grocery store. However, since I want/need to save money, I become one of the crazy people in the store. But like bananas are 19 cents guys!?! So worth it.

6:30pm: Finally, I get in line, which, at this point, stretches all the way to the door.

6:40pm: My friend Katie calls me as I am at the cash register. Katie is my friend who is always like 10 minutes early to everything. It’s super annoying especially as someone who is always 10-15 minutes late to most things (like a regular 24 year old). So she calls me to inform me she’s on 3rd & 18th walking to my apartment. For once, her pseudo-punctuality is actually super helpful because she’s close to Trader Joe’s & I convince her to come help me schlep. Blessing: human pack mules.

7:05pm: We arrive back at my apartment drenched in sweat.

7:20pm: I clean the table, put on a tablecloth and put out fresh flowers. Fresh flowers make everything look fancy AF. My sister, Gabby’s, boyfriend Chris helps me because he is a fine southern gentlemen and also probably because I scare him. Fresh flowers are an extravagance since they are useless, expensive, and they die in like a 3 days. BUT I love them… and these are from Trader Joe’s so they were only $5 for each bouquet because Trader Joe’s is a magical vertically integrated paradise and I take back every bad thing I said about it earlier!!!

7:21pm: Lauren, a friend of mine who just moved back to the USA from Australia, arrives early. Is this an Australian thing? When did I become friends with all these punctual people? What am I doing wrong? Are we all adults now or something? Lauren brings White Girl Rosé. If you buy this wine you are either making fun of yourself or making fun of the person you’re giving it to, but it’s actually pretty decent wine so I like it. It’s sort of like wine with a bonus joke. Its presence also started some political discussions about casual racism so it’s a conversation piece as well.

7:30:pm: Peter (Katie’s BF) arrives with two bottle of wine. He’s British so I think he’s just being extra polite. He does confess that they are from TJ’s wine store though, so they were probably under $10. DID I NOT MENTION TJ ALSO HAS A CHEAP WINE STORE? I literally I love this place.

The prices start at $3 so $6 is fancy. Over $10 is slap a bow on it gift quality.

7:31pm: I set out olives, sliced ciabatta, eggplant dip & red pepper dip. I put the dips in small bowls and topped them with pinenuts & red chili flakes respectively.

Trick #1: Olives are the easiest appetizer ever, you literally do nothing but put them in a bowl and then bam you’re a fancy Italian restaurant. Trick #2: if you put anything in a dish and sprinkle something on top of it people assume you made it. However, my pride in trickery conflicts with the silliness of lying about dip, so when someone asks me if I made it, I tell her the truth. I would prefer to just lie about really crucial things.

7:32pm: Alexander, arguably my fanciest friend, arrives with a type of red wine I literally have never even heard of. I drink Sancerre on the reg so I know some fancy wines. You can always count on him to bring something really nice and then be like “eh it’s probably okay, but not as good as the fine Shiraz I had last night. It’ll just have to do.” Not even in a humble brag way, he is just being totally sincere. He’s very sincerely fancy; he’s European.

Alexander drinking other people's inferior wine.

7:35pm: 6/8 of my guests have now arrived. (WHY IS EVERYONE ON TIME? - this literally never happens) My friend Helena arrives excited, “guess what I brought?” We all already know… it’s White Girl Rosé. So now two people have brought me White Girl Rosé and I have to ask myself a few hard questions like: “am I super white?” “Is everyone giving this to me ironically? or “do they think that at my core this is the best wine for me.” White Girl Rosé: bonus joke, conversation piece, provoker of transcendent identity thoughts…

7:49: My friend Sara arrives late. Thank god someone is normal and decent and late.

8:00pm: Since my schedule was delayed I spent more time in the kitchen than is ideal for a dinner party. For entertaining it is best to have everything prepped in advance so you don’t have to spend a ton of time in the kitchen. Also best to cook things you can set and forget. Things like roast chicken, lasagna or other oven dishes. However, using the oven when its 90 degrees out is ungodly. So I choose my other favorite large dinner meal: pasta. Pasta is amazing. It’s a $1 per pound and delicious.

The Menu:

· Arugula Salad with shaved parmesan, pinenuts, & homemade lemon vinaigrette · Fusilli with fresh pesto**, sautéed asparagus, shrimp, and fresh cherry tomatoes. · Ice Cream from Morgenstern’s Finest Ice Cream– brought by my lovely friend Sara

I used frozen shrimp for the following reasons: pre-cooked, cleaned, cheaper, and they are all that TJs sells. The only things that I actually “cooked” are the asparagus & and the pasta (I just defrosted the shrimp using the heat from the pasta). I like to use shortcuts for cooking when they yield similar results as the hard way. I basically combine Rachel Ray’s manic energy with Sandra Lee’s philosophies on cheating, with Ina Garten Hamptons hosting skills and then just say “BAM!” a bunch. The best tip I have ever gotten from the Food Network are from Rachel Ray (she can’t cook and her recipes are always sort of gross but bitch is efficient with her resources). She uses a bowl for trash while you’re cooking but I evolved the idea and I just use a plastic shopping bag on the counter for all the trash while I am cooking so then I just throw that out when I am done. BAM!

8:20pm: Making pesto. I was going to give the recipe for this pesto, but then I realized I didn’t use a recipe and I don’t know any of the actual amounts of things I used. I am an old, Italian grandma mad scientist at heart and stomach. I only use recipes for baking (which is science) and everything else I just sort of eyeball. Or my personal favorite- I find a recipe for “guidelines” then sort of totally ignore it because I can’t be bothered to measure things. So this is the recipe.

Clean two bushels of basil
Put Basil in your food processor, it should basically fill it
Add enough grated parmesan
Add handful of pinenuts
Add around 5-7 peeled cloves of garlic
Sprinkle on some grated pepper & kosher salt
Pour some olive oil on top
Blend
Look at it. Does it look like pesto? If not add what you think it needs from your experience with pesto.
Taste it. Does it look like pesto? If not add what you think it needs from your experience with pesto.
Blend again.
Taste – Repeat steps 8-10 as necessary.
BAM! Pesto done.

I know this isn’t very helpful, but if all else fails find a more specific recipe. Or just do what the other millennials do and buy blue apron.

Measuring things takes up precious drinking time. Martha gets me.

8:30pm: Dinner is served. Everyone is pleased. Arugula is the same price as regular spring mix but it feels fancier. Peter was like oh “rocket” (British word for arugula). Peter & Lauren have been using British slang all night like “keen” and “cringe” “reckon.” I reckon it’s a bit cringe for most, but I watch BBC America so I am used to it.

I serve the pasta with romano & parmesan because romano is way better on pasta than parmesan but America loves parmesan for some reason. Romano 4 life guys.

Finished product. Fusilli grabs the pesto.

9:00pm: I keep calling Gabby (my sister, for those of you keeping track) bae. Alexander informs me that Bae (probably spelled differently) means poop in Danish. Alexander: Danish, fancy & a dream crusher. But I don’t speak Danish so I am just going to keep using it, BAE.

10:15pm: ICE CREAM. Lovely Sara has brought very fancy ice cream; the flavors were salted chocolate & green tea. I just have the salted chocolate because I think green tea flavored desserts are disgusting. I actually think green tea is pretty gross in general. I drink it because it’s supposed to be healthy, but I would much rather have some nice Earl Grey or a Diet Coke. The salted chocolate is melting faster and then my sister proposes is it because it has salt in it? And she blows our minds: with SCIENCE!

11:00pm: Everyone leaves. There are millions of dishes. I hate doing dishes. I love my apartment but it doesn’t have a dishwasher.

If you have a dishwasher in the city it’s a huge deal. If you have a washer or a dryer in your apartment (not the building like your actual apartment) you’re the 1%. Like these are luxuries in NY, the things that almost everyone else in America has. Luckily my sister Gabby is an obsessive cleaner and usually manically does all the dishes like Monica Gellar on coke but since her BF is in town I feel a little bad about sticking her with the mess. So can someone else come do these? But like can someone actually come and do all these dishes? Please. Thanks. BAM!

*My new cookbook will be out soon Dinner for Capitalists: How to Placate the Proletariat

** I was going to cheat and just buy pesto, because I was short on time, but then TJ’s was out of fucking pesto so I HAD to make it. Fuck you TJ’s (JK I LOVE YOU DON’T BE MAD BAE).