Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 10, 1994 TAG: 9409270002
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ALMENA HUGHES STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Set up your best tea service under white canvas tents filled with fragrant flowers and serve a bride- or mom-to-be and guests hot and cold gourmet teas, sweets and savories from rolling tea carts. Or set up your most durable dining ware, pour sun tea over orange slices, bake batches of fresh cookies, muffins and sweet breads and have a Mad Hatter's party straight out of "Alice In Wonderland" for the kids.
Theme parties are not only fun and special, they're ultimately easier to give because they force the host to focus on menu, decorations and mood. Imagination easily overcomes the need to be elaborate or to go to great expense.
Serve pretzels, crackers, popcorn, peanuts or sunflower seeds in colored paper bags with the tops folded down, or have the kids decorate brown paper bags with colored markers. Fill small terra cotta flower pots or tiny silver buckets with ice and set butter-filled ramekins inside.
For a "Rockin' Jerk Reggae Party," the makers of Red Stripe Lager beer suggest placing on each table a fish bowl layered with colored sand (available in pet stores) and filled with goldfish swimming around. When the party ends, the bowls can double as party favors.
For the storybook tea, the Lipton tea makers say wrap decks of cards as party favors or spread the cards out as a table-top decoration. If you need a couple of maddening trivia questions, find out who knows that afternoon tea was invented in England around 1840 by Anna, Duchess of Bedford, or that a sterling sugar spoon is shaped like a shell because during colonial times sugar was scooped out of bulk shipping sacks with a sea shell.
In "How to Board Up Your Kitchen and Cook from a Hammock" ($14.95, Top of the Mountain Publishing, Largo, Fla.) author/TV cook Virginia Elliott suggests buying from a deli cheese, salad and desserts, then providing whatever meat your budget allows. Now "beg, borrow or buy" for each guest one 6-inch wide clay flower pot" and fit it with builder's metal mesh hardware cloth. Place easy-light charcoal briquets in each pot, set out the meat, appropriate sauces and marinades and let each guest build his own fire in a pot and cook and season his meat to taste. Depending upon your preference, call it a no-cook cookout or a legal pot party.
Elliott's unillustrated book, incidentally, reads like a conversation with a food-savvy friend, casually interweaving recipes and cooking hints with memories of the author's 1930s childhood up to current events. She talks a little about healthful cooking, but the main focus is on leaving cooks time to relax and swing in the hammock. To order, call (800) 356-9315.
Foods or beverages also can form a theme, as in the increasingly popular beer parties and dinners, revolving around the more than 1400 alcoholic and 36 nonalcoholic brews available. The longtime party standard, pate, takes new form in a pate sandwich party suggested by Les Trois Petits Cochons. Contact the company at (800) LES PATES; (800) 537-7283 for ideas on pate as a first-course, in salads, even in barbecues.
The makers of ZIPLOC storage bags suggest a finger-foods party. A rule of thumb - pardon the pun - is to figure two or three bites per variety per person. For a cocktail party, plan on 10-15 bites per person, only four to six bites per person if dinner follows. Request the free cook booklet "Fingerman's Fingerfood Favorites" from ZIPLOC Storage Bags, Dept. 6300-PK, Box 78980, New Augusta, Ind. 46278.
\ APRICOT-WALNUT BRIE BITES
POPPY SEED-LEMON BISCOTTI
ORANGE CORNMEAL SHORTBREADS
SPINACH TERRINE ON BAGUETTE WITH SPINACH AND ROQUEFORT MAYONNAISE
\ OTHER PATE SANDWICH POSSIBILITIES
SPINACH TERRINE SANDWICH: 4 oz. Spinach Terrine with Roquefort, sun-dried or fresh tomatoes on a croissant or roll, served warm.
PATE DE CAMPAGNE: 4 oz. Country Pate, on a baguette or roll with lettuce, cornichons and mustard. Any coarse pate makes a delicious sandwich!
THREE-LAYER VEGETABLE TERRINE: 3 oz. Three-Layer Vegetable Terrine on whole grain bread with sprouts. Top with a slice of Gruyere cheese and broil.
OPEN FACE SHRIMP TERRINE SANDWICH: 3 oz. Shrimp Terrine served on thin slices of black bread, topped with caviar (optional). Slice Shrimp Terrine on black bread in half on a diagonal.
\ RED STRIPE DIP
JERKED CHICKEN WITH RICE
PLANTAIN FLAMBE
TERESA'S OSSO BUCCO
ROASTED RED PEPPER DIP
PESTO DIPPERS
DILLED SALMON-CHEESE STACKS
SPINACH FETA MINI-QUICHES
PROSCIUTTO WRAPS
ROAD HOUSE COTTAGE CHEESE
by CNB