Lucky 12 Dinner series!

We were asked to bring a stick of gum, a travel size bottle of hand lotion, a roll of scotch tape, a pen and a paper for a night of mysterious food and conversation. The L12 "Lucky 12" dinner series developed by Culture Producer and now Thompson Toronto Experience, Events and Programming visionary, Marcello Cabezas is an invite only dinner party for individuals classified as experts in their fields with an open mind and heart.  
This particular evening was hosted by the underground restaurant House of Commons with our exclusive chef for the evening Peter who hails from Caplansky and our sommelier Mark who paired my favourite, organic cava for our entrance cocktail and decadent and bold wines with every course.  The company we kept ranged from all different industries and disciplines from the finance sector to media, fashion, PR, and car industry all seated together in one long table.  Marcello was, as one would call him the Masters Massacrer of ceremonies and had each of us write down questions and would lead us each to answer so the conversation was always flowing but only enough to answer the question and then to move on... no one was allowed to stray from the questions, no sidebar discussion as Marcello was on a tight agenda and his goal was to have every question at the table answered.  The questions ranged from all types of topics from the very creative as drawing your emotions on a piece of paper to the serious - how would you describe love to a person who had never felt it before.
But of course, what you are waiting for is the report about our dinner, which was delicious!  Being that our chef was from Caplansky - our entire dinner was very carnivorous!

For our playful starter- we had a buffalo wing spiced popcorn which definitely had a kick to it served in little tea cups.  This is a very unique and fun way to start dinner always!
Our soup course was a 5 mushroom consomme, you can taste the earthiness of the mushrooms and definitely there was one big juicy shitaki mushroom to enjoy.  Our main was buffalo rack ribs which were tender and juicy but the BBQ sauce that was paired with it was what gave the dish UMMPH!

This sauce was made in tribute to Peter (our chef's) girlfriend because it has a sweet and feisty side and you can definitely taste it as it gives you a little kick in your throat when you were least expecting it!  The delicious dessert was homemade hazelnut ice cream presented on an inverted cone with honeycomb and blackberries.  It was very rich and nutty and amazing!
While the courses continued to come, we were still engaged in conversation and only stopped to take bites of our food, drink and savour those moments. 

It was truly an intriguing night of great company, interesting dialogue and of course good food.  Marcello continues to hosts these dinners series and who knows you may be 'chosen' as the L12 next time!  As for the props, the paper and pen was handy for drawing and writing questions on.  The hand creme was used obviously to keep our hands moisturized.  The tape was used to tape up the questions we wrote down on a mirror at one side of the room at the end of the night. And the gum was to make sure our breath was fresh after our dinner.  See- it's all a master plan!!

House of Commons - www.mabelgray.ca