Easter Dinner

I know, I know... I'm a bad blogger. Let's pretend that I'm a fabulous blogger and that I haven't taken a 7-8 month break! This time around I'm going to do things a bit different... I still plan to blog about recipes but I don't want to limit myself so much because I may just have a few other things that I want to talk about! So here we go... this one is a bit about food and little bit about another love of mine- parties (which of course go hand in hand with food!).

For Easter this year, Evan and I invited his family to our house for dinner. This was my first time to host a family holiday celebration at my own house and I was nervous but very excited at the same time! I worked all week on the table decor and the menu. I decided that I wanted a rustic/garden feel for the table and a pretty light menu to match!

This is how the table turned out:

And this was the menu:

Grilled Pork Tenderloin

Skillet Cream style Corn (for my sis-in-law, it's her fav!)

Glazed Carrots

Fresh Green Beans

Cloverleaf Dinner Rolls

Carrot Cake

In order not to make myself go crazy (a lesson I learned from my previous blog failure! haha) I am not going to post all 6 of those recipes... at least not all in the same post! Tonight I am going to give you the recipe for the marinade I used on the tenderloin and the recipe for Paula Deen's grandmother's Carrot Cake (now you know it's good!).

Pork Tenderloin Marinade

Ingredients:

1/2 cup peanut oil

1/3 cup soy sauce

1/4 cup red wine vinegar

3 T. lemon juice

2 T. Worcestershire sauce

1 clove garlic crushed

1 T. chopped fresh parsley

1 T. dry mustard

1 1/2 t. black pepper

Directions:

Mix all ingredients together and poor over tenderloins. Marinate for at least an hour. *Note: this recipe is for two pork tenderloins (they are packaged two in a package).

Grandmama Hiers's Carrot Cake

(Paula Deen's recipe taken from "The Lady and Sons" cookbook):

Cake Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 cups sugar

2 t. baking soda

2 t. cinnamon

1 t. salt

4 eggs

1 1/2 cups vegetable oil

3 cups grated carrots

1 1/2 cups chopped pecans (optional- but highly recommended!)

Cake Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Add eggs and vegetable oil and mix well; add carrots and pecans. Pour into three 9-inch round greased, floured pans. Bake for approximately 40 minutes. Remove from oven and cool for 5 minutes. Remove from pans, place on wax paper, and allow to cool completely before frosting.

Frosting Ingredients:

One 8 ounce pkg. cream cheese

8 T. butter

One 16 ounce box powdered sugar

1 t. vanilla

1/2 cup chopped pecans

Frosting Directions:

Combine all ingredients except for nuts and beat until fluffy. Stir in nuts. Frost cake.

Here are a few other pics from the event:

Some of the side dishes.

The "cake table."

My hubby: the master griller at our house!

Jack says, "Come back tomorrow night!! My mom promises to post again!"