Food for thought
An LZF garden party is always a feast for the senses
We’re a pretty sensual lot here at LZF. So, as you can imagine, when we have a garden party, it’s the senses we love to engage. It’s all about creating the perfect atmosphere for our guests…
We start with a magical setting; that being our garden. To be honest, nature has done most of the work for us, providing beautiful shady trees for us to hang our lamps on. This is where Marivi’s keen eye for detail excels; she just seems to know what light will look perfect in any situation.
Next we select a playlist of very groovy music for our guests to listen to. It might be jazz, trip-hop, classical, or the contemporary beats of our good friend Rithma.
And finally, there’s the food.
Sandro is no stranger to catering. Matter of fact his first job was spent in the kitchen and on the floor of 5-star restaurants, so he knows how the entire process works. And nowadays he does most of the cooking in the family home, guided by the impeccable taste-buds of his beautiful Marivi and daughter Jana.
But when it comes to the legendary LZF dinner parties, he leaves the catering to the experts, that being our good mates, the four brothers from Las Bairetas in Chiva.
Las Bairetas have an ability to touch the soul with their rustic, yet delicate Spanish cuisine. Marcus comes over and cooks the paella for us on over our fire in the garden. As the main chef, Pablo oversees the rest of the food, while Rodrigo takes charge of the wine and floor service. The whole affair is quite theatrical.
Our most recent garden party was for a group of international magazine editors and design studios.
As usual Marivi orchestrated the setting, thoughtfully placing the furniture around the lawn and selecting the appropriate lamps to create a magical backdrop.
Marcus produced a most marvellous fidegua; a Valencian specialty that is similar to a paella but made with short pasta, prawns, calamari and monk fish. Our guests also dined on freshly cut jamon, oysters and a selection of tapas.
We all relaxed with Spanish wines, margaritas and negroni cocktails (and in case you don’t know, a negroni is made from one part gin, one part vermouth rosso (red, semi-sweet), and one part Campari, garnished with orange peel).
