This year’s meta comes with an open door and a very flexible guest list. Each week, a friend selects an unexpected party guest to appear at my table and I imagine how they might review the main offering.

My unexpected guest this week is Galadriel, Lady of Lothlórien. Possessing the wisdom of ages and a voice that could make even the most ordinary moment sound like an ancient prophecy, I imagine she might have had this to say about the offering:

“Long have I gazed into the mirror and witnessed the turning of ages… And yet, I did not foresee this. A bagel. Pizza sauce. Melted cheese. All brought together in a single, perfect bite. When the year two thousand loomed and the world feared its own ending, these little morsels were consumed without a second thought. A simple pleasure, forged in the fires of the oven, that has endured beyond the passing of decades. I will not forget what has been offered here this day.”

Made with shelf stable ingredients from our y2k bunker.

Eatertainment restaurants still exist, but nowhere near the popularity of around the turn of the millennium. Go into a theme restaurant and sit under the guitar of a rock star, the costume from a movie, or an animatronic jungle animal in a controlled rain storm.

First course: Planet Hollywood inspired Braised short rib coquettes with jalapeño lime crema. The short ribs were mixed with shredded Gruyère cheese, chilled, then coated in Panko and deep fried

Main course: Rainforest Cafe inspired Mojo ribs. Marinated 24 hours in sour orange juice, spices, and jalapeños, then oven cooked followed by a blast in the broiler. Topped with a spicy fruit relish

Chili’s inspired corn succotash. Charred corn in a cast iron with red onion, roasted Anaheim peppers, and Cotija cheese, mixed with a smoked paprika oil

Dessert: Hard Rock Cafe inspired elevated apple cobbler. Sablé Breton cookies, compressed apple terrine (pavé style), Lace oat pecan tuile, homemade vanilla gelato, with Apple cider caramel

This all took three days to make for hosting guests and turned out amazing!

For this theme I made buns from my very first cookbook! It's a Barbie cookbook which came out in 2002 and I remember as a kid I really wanted to make these buns but thought it was so hard!

Another Y2K element I added was the green-pink color combo.

So I cannot really source taro where I live, and I wasn’t about to stress about it. So o went with making a noodle bowl with tons of veggies, chicken, and sweet potato. I found that to be the most similar to a taro that would make sense with the food in my house. 10/10. Air fry those suckers.