H: At long last...the tasting

Yesterday we were in Foresthill at the Monte Verde Inn for our tasting. There was a variety of food from all over the menu, and due to space restrictions as well as time restrictions and I'm sure money restrictions on their part, we sampled only the most popular portions of the menu. These included garlic chicken, Santa Fe styled tri tip, and veal roulade. Side dishes included scalloped potatoes, mushroom risotto with white truffle oil, and potato gnocchi. Then of course, there was cake:

(Trust me, it tastes as good as it looks)

The tasting was also an open house where we could meet vendors that we hadn't yet (Shana Beals make up and O'Shays flowers), and meet some that we didn't expect to see there but were so glad that we did (Event Nannies). It was also a wonderful opportunity to catch up with one of our vendors already established; our darling Mr. Joe. After sampling his DJ skills, we are even happier that he's our man! Simply fabulous.
As far as the food goes, it was, as expected, very good. We decided on beef (oh-man-delicious) for dinner and are so far undecided on the second entree. We were very regrettably unimpressed with the chicken (though others seemed to love it), which was very disappointing for us since we really, really wanted to enjoy it and have a chicken and a beef entree. Josh enjoyed the Veal loin roulade, but I'm hesitant to have two beef dishes. But no matter, we are very confident that the matter will work itself out. We thoroughly enjoyed the potato gnocchi and the mushroom risotto and - even though they're on another menu - we plan to incorporate them into our meal.
As for one of the most important parts - the cake - we were most impressed with the chocolate eclair cake: golden pound cake soaked with hazelnut liqueur filled with Bavarian cream and topped with chocolate ganache. Actually, Josh isn't big on chocolate so we'll be substituting the ganache with Chantelly cream. Hello YUM!!!
All in all it was a productive day, and we look forward to continuing on with our planning!