Thanksgiving Dinner For Malawi

My boyfriend's brother, Oli, is heading to Malawi in the summer to help with several charity projects. To raise money for one of the charities, Open Arms (http://www.openarmsmalawi.org), we held a pop-up restaurant for 23 guests. The basic idea of the pop-up restaurant was that guests could come and enjoy a delicious three course dinner, listen to a presentation about Oli's plans in Malawi and the charities involved, and then they could pay whatever they thought the meal was worth, with all the donations going to Open Arms.

 Thanksgiving Turkey with the Malawian Flag

It was in November so we went for a Thanksgiving feast theme with some Malawian surprises thrown in!

Nsima is a staple food in Malawi and is similar to polenta. It is usually shaped into solid patties which can then be dipped into other dishes, a delicious homemade pea and ham soup for example! The main meal was pretty straight forward. The glazed sweet potatoes were simple but very delicious, a good alternative to roast potatoes. I will try and find the recipe and share it with you. The Malawi yellow rice was full of spices like cinnamon and some raisons. It was surprisingly good, especially as I don't actually like cinnamon! The Malawian cabbage was a mixture of cabbage and tomatoes and was also delicious. I will find and add the recipes for these dishes asap, just in case anyone out there wants to try some Malawian food.

 Malawian Cabbage

I was in charge of the desserts and I thought a selection of mini desserts would be more fun than just one dessert.

Pumpkin Pie

Chocolate Chip Whoopie Pies

I am particularly proud of the pumpkin pies because I have never made one before and they turned out so perfectly. They were a joint effort with my boyfriend's mum and I think she was equally happy with the results. Whoopie pies are half way between a cake and a biscuit with a marshmallowy filling. The mini Boston Cream Pies were little vanilla cupcakes filled with a vanilla custard and topped with a chocolate ganache. Both the whoopie pies and the Boston cream pies recipes came from the Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days recipe book, which is a must have for any cake lover. It is one of those recipe books where you want to make everything immediately. It also has plenty of photos which I like in a recipe book, and some good technical hints and tips which helps when you're trying something new, like the whoopie pies.

It was a fantastic evening and we managed to raise over £900 for Open Arms. We are planning a second event in the spring with an Italian theme. Hopefully it will go as well as the first one did!