Food brings everyone together, especially during the
holidays. One of the best parts of the season is spending time with loved ones
and stuffing your face to your heart’s content. But let’s be real, I pretty
much do that at every meal. I had the pleasure of attending my first holiday
party of the season at Irene Matys of The Spicy Olive’s beautiful home, where
she prepared an amazing holiday feast for myself and 6 other foodie friends.
Irene and I had been following each other on Instagram for a
long while and as a huge admirer of her delicious recipes and food, I was
thrilled to be able to take our Insta-friendship from online to offline and taste her cooking for myself. And I wasn’t disappointed. Irene effortlessly
whipped up an incredible meal, incorporating four different Bonne Maman jams:
Cherry, Blueberry, Orange Marmalade, and Caramel. For decades, Bonne Maman has
been creating their special preserves in France, with all natural ingredients
and no artificial colours, additives, or preserves. Upon first bite, I instantly
fell in love with their jams and practically licked spoonfuls of them straight
from the jar. No shame.
Irene creatively used a different Bonne Maman jam into each dish,
highlighting the jam’s flavour profile and bringing them to the forefront. While
getting to know one another, we munched on a local cheese board with spiced
nuts, dried fruit, and a lovely cherry jam port and herb preserve. We then
feasted on a winter salad with pears, cranberries, pecans, and goat feta tossed
in a delicious blueberry jam balsamic vinaigrette. And what’s a holiday dinner
without some turkey? Irene crafted a turkey roulade with an orange mandarin jam
sauce, served with a crispy shallot potato mash and herbed carrots. Not your
traditional turkey with gravy, Irene’s version was sweeter with the burst of orange
marmalade sauce.
The dinner ended on a sweet note, and my favourite component
of any meal -– dessert. We indulged in a vanilla bean ricotta ice cream, with a
warm sweet wine and raisin caramel spread sauce, and topped with a cherry jam
macaron. This was probably my favourite dish and I could’ve easily had seconds
(or thirds). The dulce de leche jam was so good, I scooped more spoonfuls of it
into my dessert because there’s no such thing as too much dulce de leche right?
I left the dinner that night with my stomach full, and my
heart inspired by the wonderful people I had met, especially the loveliest host and
The Spicy Olive herself. For delicious recipes and to see more photos from that night, check out Irene's site here.
