I recently attended a birthday party, and was tasked with making some of the dishes for the party (as is usually the case). Seeing as some of the guests were “old-school” about their dining preferences, I decided to use up some of the more “old-school” recipes. 1-8: Delicious Cocktail Snacks looks exactly like something a waiter would be carrying around at a fancy cocktail party in an old movie.
So retro. These were pretty easy to make, and actually held really well in the fridge before the party. I reheated them at the party and it worked great–just a thought if you need something for a party that you can make earlier, transport and/or reheat later.
I’ve never made these before, but they’re pretty simple canapés. Along with 1-22: Onion-Potato Diamonds, you could have yourself a pretty fun 80s cocktail party.
Ingredients. I went with a cheddar/jack blend for my shredded cheese (pretty tasty). The small shrimp (salad shrimp) are in the deli wrap–I got about ¼ lb, which was enough for this recipe.
Cheese dough–very similar to the dough from 5-15: Cheese Sticks. The cracker-like bottom part is pretty close to the cheese sticks as well after it’s been baked.
Wrapped it up into a ball and stuck it in the fridge while I made the toppings.
Chopped up about ½ of a yellow onion and mixed in the squeezed out/thawed-but-previously-frozen chopped spinach & the Parmesan cheese. There’s topping #1.
Cheated and bought pre-diced ham. I mixed that with some blue cheese crumbles and diced about ½ of a red bell pepper (that one I didn’t cheat on). Topping #2 done.
Mixed my salad shrimp with some mayonnaise, Dijon mustard & Parmesan cheese. So many sauce/dressing recipes are essentially some form of mayo and Dijon. OK, topping #3 done as well.
The whole gang’s here. All my mise is done, now I can start rolling and cutting dough.
Cut the dough in half, rather unceremoniously.
Rolled them out into two-somewhat-equal tubes of dough, and cut them up into about ½”- ¾” pieces. I count about 50 pieces in that picture, so I suppose those are slightly bigger than Simply Delicious envisioned, as they claim this recipe yields 60 pieces. I was only feeding 5 people, so I was okay with being a bit short.
Pressed each piece out to less than ¼” thickness and spread them out over two silicone baking mats (I like Silpat, but here’s some comparable ones) on baking sheets. The ones pictured are the same exact mats except the one on the right is about 8-9 years old–the one on the left is almost brand new (a thrift store score).
Why use silicone baking mats when the recipe says ungreased sheets? Because with the silicone mats, you’ll get an airier, lighter texture to your cracker–especially a cheese one.
Counter space was at a premium at this point–good thing sheet pans fit well over sinks. Top left–shrimp/mayo mixture. Bottom left/top right–spinach/onion mixture. Bottom right–ham/blue cheese/pepper mixture. Into the oven they go. I plan to undercook them just slightly so that when I reheat them at the party (which I did) they’ll be done perfectly.
Out of the oven. Cooked, but not as brown as you’d like. Remember, they’ll be reheated in an oven later, cooking them further.
Shrimp/mayo mixture started to brown, but didn’t get all the way there. Wrapped both sheet pans as is (with the mats and everything) and transported them to the party stacked. With the raised edge around the rim of the pan, it was just enough to keep the wrap from touching the snacks. At the party, I took the wrap off, warmed the oven, and stuck them in as is for about 5-7 minutes at 350°F to finish them off.
Sample plate of one of each. The party guests enjoyed the shrimp/mayo ones the most, followed by the spinach ones (not a lot of ham eaters), and then the blue cheese/ham/pepper. I enjoyed them all, but I think the shrimp/mayo one was probably my favorite too. I’d definitely try them again with some topping variations, they were pretty fun to make.
Grade: A
