Your big event is coming up and you need to decide what appetizers to serve. With so many recipes to choose from how will you ever decide? Should you make healthy choices? Go with a favorite cuisine? What about those comforting foods that we all know are bad for us but they taste so good?
When you are choosing your appetizers, of course the first consideration is your budget. You may have caviar tastes and a hot dog budget. Luckily, there are so many appetizer recipes out there to choose from that you should be able to find several that will please you and your guests. Label each dish so any guests that have food allergies know which ones to avoid and which ones to enjoy.
There is a world of appetizers at your fingertips. Focus on a single ingredient to form a theme, such as cheese, poultry, or seafood. You can use cheese in quesadillas, cubes or melted on toast tips. Poultry can easily fill kabobs or dumplings. Seafood may appear in crab cakes, dumplings or you can make delectable shrimp or scallops wrapped in bacon. Alternatively, you may want to make a spread of finger sandwiches with a variety of fillings.
If you do not want to use meat, you could make mushroom quiche, filo dough stuffed with feta and olives or asparagus rollups. If you want your appetizers strictly vegetarian, try vegetable spring rolls and dumplings or potato puffs. They are amazing!
Puff pastry is one of the great conveniences available in your freezer section at the market. Use them to make beef and mushroom turnovers, tiny beef Wellingtons, or cheese straws. You can even use it to enclose a wheel of Brie topped with delicious caramelized onions. Use it with little smoky sausages to create tiny hot dogs, forming the bun out of the pastry. Alternatively, you can form little pastry cups and fill them with seasoned chicken, sundried tomatoes or any other filling your heart desires.
If you want to make something, your guests will not expect, try filling tiny dishes with spaghetti, and top it off with a single meatball. Everyone will love this! You could try another cutting edge appetizer such as a chicken tender encrusted with pecans and served on a skewer with mustard sauce. Sliders are another very popular appetizer now. These tiny burgers come with all the fixings.
Mexican appetizers can be an entire theme by themselves. Mini tacos, empanadas, and tortilla chips served with a fresh salsa can be a big hit. Asian appetizers are another possible theme you can go with. Serve up some spring rolls, samosas, and potstickers. For a real Asian crunch, wrap up a crisp water chestnut with sweet, apple-smoked bacon.
In the end, what matters is that your guests are happy. You can make yourself happy too by making as many of these appetizers as possible ahead of time. This gives you time to enjoy your party.
There are many easy party appetizers that you can make whenever you need them. Store some for after school snacks. Make them for picnics, potlucks or the big game. Knowing you have a few easy tricks you can rely on will ease your stress and let you enjoy your gathering.
