Party Night

Last night was an open house for Pampered Chef with my friend and PC consultant Michele. I went with two of my other friends and we had a blast. 

It was a taste-testing party of all the goodies in the Pampered Chef Pantry. When we arrived, Michele had a nice variety of dips, sauces and chips. 

The dill dip and the southwestern dip were both huge hits. 

We had some cream cheese that we could use in our experiments. I love the bamboo serving trays. 

And some crackers displayed on the line of white serving pieces.

Then we could mix and match sauces on our cheese and crackers or try the chips with the dip. 

I knew we were in for a treat when Michele set this on the table. 

Usually, when I see her use this particular pan, I know there will be chicken. And I love chicken. I wasn't disappointed. Here was the chicken with some of  the Pampered Chef rub. I forgot to ask what rub she used because I couldn't wait to dig in. 

She had dinner roll size buns for our taste testing. Many ate their chicken as a sandwich with one of the variety of sauces such as Carolina Mustard BBQ or the Raspberry Habanero. My friend Sherrie said the Teriyaki Sauce with honey was the best to her. I didn't do mine on a sandwich. I wanted to try several so I just shredded my chicken to try some different dips. First place in my book was the Sweet and Sour Sauce. Oh my! I am the world's pickiest eater and it is very hard to get me to try something new. So to try it and like it was a double shock. I do like Sweet and Sour sauce but am very choosy about what brand I buy. What did I think of the Pampered Chef brand? Unbelievably delicious. I couldn't get enough. I kept thinking how good it would be with Hillshire Lil Smokies. Yum!

My second choice was the Spicy Pineapple Rum sauce (which doesn't really have rum in it just rum flavoring I'm told.) It has small chunks of pineapple in it. I did like it and I think it would be great over grilled or baked chicken. I failed to notice the word spicy on the bottle so the little "kick" came as a mild but pleasant surprise. 

Then came my favorite part of the night. The moment I had been waiting for.....the ice cream topping taste test. We were all served bowls of ice cream to create our own smorgasbord of flavor.

So many choices. The Chocolate Raspberry was a favorite of some. Others preferred the Cherry Almond. I decided to experiment with four. I liked the Chocolate Caramel a little. I liked the Chocolate Peppermint even more and the Chocolate Peanut Butter was pretty good. 

But when I got to the Caramel Sauce...oh wow! Needless to say I had to order a jar of this. Only problem is I'm afraid that when it gets here I may have my own party....just me, my caramel sauce and big bowl carton of ice cream. This sauce was so delicious. It would be awesome heated up and poured over warm spice cake. Or fixed as a dip for sliced apples. This one is going to become a standard item to be found in my pantry. 

I was glad I did the taste test on all of them first. Then I got to drizzle the lovely caramel all over my ice cream. 

Doesn't that look delicious. 

In addition, to buying a jar of the caramel sauce, they had a new product that I just had to have. The French Fry Cutter. I am really excited about it. Not only did I want it to make home fries but so I can make bacon cheese fries as well. Yum. Can't wait to get it.

There were several other products that I don't have that I want. So I did what I normally do. I booked a party. Now, I can make me a wish list for things I want to earn free. I am shooting for the Candy Thermometer. Mine broke and was one of those cheap old timey ones with the red ball on the end that fogs up from the steam of the candy and you can hardly see the "soft ball stage". So I want one from Pampered Chef, it is awesome. And extremely heavy duty. 

I also want the new Brownie Pan. Perfect size brownies every time. I'm thinking "Make the brownies. Serve them warm with a scoop of ice cream and drizzle caramel sauce over it all." Sound good to anybody but me?

It was a great night. Michele served us some awesome food and let us experiment. She shared ideas about the products of Pampered Chef and how to incorporate the Pantry items into our meals. She even shared an idea she saw on Pinterest for the shower. She placed another shower rod on the back wall of the shower. She bought little baskets and hooked shower curtain hooks through them and mounted the baskets right in the shower. Now there is plenty room for each family member to keep their soaps and shampoos. 

All in all, it was a fantastic evening. Thanks, Michele, for having us over.