Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is OP—wow, thank you all! You really overdelivered! I’m now planning on:
- Shrimp cocktail
- Triscuits plus a Knorr/mayo dip (maybe the artichoke/leek?)
- either cheese straws or devils on horseback or the ham hideaways

Thoughts? If a friend asked for inspiration, what should I add? (We often have someone bring cheese & fancy crackers, so might steer away from that combo.)

Update post-party: it was a hit! I ended up making shrimp cocktail (served in my grandmother’s cut glass bowl with a diy ice mold), cheese straws (puffy pastry based), and devils on horseback (half blue cheese, half almond). All pretty easy and turned out well! A friend brought Aperol spritzes. 70s Pandora rounded out the mood. Lots of fun! Thank you all!

Next up, Iranian inspiration….

I loved this topic and I love that you updated us! The Food and Cooking forum really is the best of DCUM (minus the never-ending mayonnaise wars).

You should start a topic for Iranian/Persian food- YUM!

Sounds delightful! It’s good you did not make the “ham hideaways” - I had never heard of them, but as a PP said they were featured in Somebody, Somewhere (the best show) and called “St Louis Sushi” so my guess is they are more a midwestern app

signed, NP whose waspy grandparents put out ritz with a block of cream cheese and pepper jelly when people visited them in cape cod in the summers (usually it was just a small (small!) bowl of potato chips)

Anonymous wrote:This is OP—wow, thank you all! You really overdelivered! I’m now planning on:
- Shrimp cocktail
- Triscuits plus a Knorr/mayo dip (maybe the artichoke/leek?)
- either cheese straws or devils on horseback or the ham hideaways

Thoughts? If a friend asked for inspiration, what should I add? (We often have someone bring cheese & fancy crackers, so might steer away from that combo.)

Update post-party: it was a hit! I ended up making shrimp cocktail (served in my grandmother’s cut glass bowl with a diy ice mold), cheese straws (puffy pastry based), and devils on horseback (half blue cheese, half almond). All pretty easy and turned out well! A friend brought Aperol spritzes. 70s Pandora rounded out the mood. Lots of fun! Thank you all!

Next up, Iranian inspiration….

Anonymous wrote:To be deviled eggs is so 80s. Maybe because my mom used to make them and often whenever you went to a party there would be deviled eggs. I never made them, so for me, they stayed in 80’s / early 90’s.

I think they were also popular in the era OP is referencing, and also even earlier. I can't be the only one with their great grandmother's depression era deviled egg plate.

[quote=Anonymous]Cream cheese with red pepper jelly /apricot jam poured over the entire block. Served with triscuits or wheat thins [/quote].

I thought this was a southern thing!

Anonymous wrote:To be deviled eggs is so 80s. Maybe because my mom used to make them and often whenever you went to a party there would be deviled eggs. I never made them, so for me, they stayed in 80’s / early 90’s.

My MIL went to a party once where everyone ended up bringing deviled eggs. It was hysterical.

Anonymous wrote:A container of Boursin cheese next to a baguette that nobody has bothered to slice up, because no guest is actually going to eat said Boursin or baguette.

Omg. I would eat all of it!

To be deviled eggs is so 80s. Maybe because my mom used to make them and often whenever you went to a party there would be deviled eggs. I never made them, so for me, they stayed in 80’s / early 90’s.

Salmon mousse in the curved copper salmon mold with club crackers.

Cheeseball rolled in pecans with ritz

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Punch in a punch bowl was big in the 1970s.

Did anyone else have that ice ring mold, into which mom froze sprite and grapes, to keep the punch cold??

I recall seeing the ice ring inside the punch bowl.

When I think of punch bowls, I recall parties where somebody invariably spiked the punch bowl with alcohol. Maybe that's why they went out of vogue, but I don't ever recall anything beyond a mischievous spiking with alcohol.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone remember that cheese spread in a ball with port wine cheese blended in? I was not partial to it but it was fancy party food in the 1970s.

I special-order this and give it to my brother for Christmas every year. That's how special it was to him growing up.

I love this story. Nostalgia at its best.

Love it as well.

Anonymous wrote:Warm spinach dip in a hollowed out pumpernickel loaf, with the bread cubes for dipping.

Cream cheese/ parmesan/ artichoke dip with triscuits.

And hell yeah shrimp cocktail!

Has anyone seen the pumpernickel round with the spinach inside lately? I would always eat a few bites then get skeeved out bc the spinach would stick in my teeth, but it was also a cold spinach dip so the spianch texture was jarring. A warm spinach dip solves for this problem and sounds delightful!

I will add- a whole log of summer sausage next to a sleeve of Ritz.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone remember that cheese spread in a ball with port wine cheese blended in? I was not partial to it but it was fancy party food in the 1970s.

I special-order this and give it to my brother for Christmas every year. That's how special it was to him growing up.

I love this story. Nostalgia at its best.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone remember that cheese spread in a ball with port wine cheese blended in? I was not partial to it but it was fancy party food in the 1970s.

I special-order this and give it to my brother for Christmas every year. That's how special it was to him growing up.

That’s really sweet. It makes me think of Hickory Farms at the mall and their little strawberry candies.