30th birthday should be the last party one should have. Turning older than that is kind of depressing. Especially if you host a party for yourself, it’s kind of sad, and you gotta get completely wasted..

This was my case. My friend Donald suggested that he would host a party for me, but I knew all he can get is some catered crap from Whole Foods, and plastic cups for drinks. So I decided to host my own birthday party last weekend.

I’ve been hosting parties, as you know from many of my older posts, so it wasn’t stressful. I made some of my signature stuff, using phyllo cups, and some new items.

I don’t have pictures, but the best hit of the evening was tuna tartar with avocado. I marinated cubed tuna in soy sauce and wasabi overnight, then cut up avocado, mixed them. Put it on a rice cracker, it’s always a huge hit among my people.

Item #1
My take on spinakopita. I don’t like feta (I am very Japanese on cheese front, I hate most of stinky kinds), so I used ricotta instead. I didn’t even bother to look for recipe, and just mixed up ricotta, parmesan, frozen spinach, egg, salt, pepper, put it on 5 layers of phyllo dough. I guess it was a bit too big as a finger food, also people were afraid it was too flakey and they make a mess on the floor. This was the least eaten items of the evening.

Item #2
Crescent dough filled with kielbasa. Easy as hell, and it’s filling for heavy drinking evening.

Item #3
Instead of my usual dates wrapped with bacon, I added shrimp to kick up a notch. This was definitely one of the favorites.

Item #4
Arugula salad and procuitto in phyllo cup.

Item #5
This was interesting. I cooked asparagus in chicken broth, pureed them, mixed with room temp cream cheese. Then I pipe it out in phyllo cups, put small cucumber slice, smoked salmon, and topped with dill. Hint of asparagus was quite cute.

Yeah, I even made my own birthday flower arrangement.
Item #6
I wasn’t sure what to do about birthday cake, so I made macaron cake. Yep, I am still making macarons. Instead of usual bite size, I made huge rounds, made raspberry cream, and sandwiched with raspberries. It was fabulous.

Item #7
I realized it would be difficult to stick candles in macaron (it will definitely break), so at last minute, I made rolled cake. Sponge was basically eggs, sugar and cake flour, and inside is whipped cream and left over raspberry. I dusted powder sugar on top. It’s not birthday cake-ish, but at least I could stick candleds in this one.

I don’t remember from 10:30 on, but I believe everyone had sufficient amount of booze, food and fun time. Hosting my own birthday party was a good idea. I can make what I like, I can choose who to invite (since it’s my own home), and I can end the party when I want. Although I have no idea what time we finished the party at my home (I remember I was at a bar, realized it was 3am), it was definitely fun.

If you want to wish me a happy birthday, it’s not too late. My real birthday is tomorrow 5/13.