Oscar Party Menu

No Oscar Party is complete without a killer menu.  I’ve put my thinking cap on to refine last year’s menu keeping the traditional favorites and adding in a few new fabulous offerings!

For the dessert table: 

The star of the show – Gold Dusted Chocolate Oscars in milk and dark chocolate:

The second star of the show: The chocolate strawberry tower:

Some crowd tested favorites: Pioneer Woman’s Chocolate Truffles with Sea Salt:

Then a bit of Pinterest inspiration with Chocolate Dipped Raspberries:

Individual Tiramisu Shooters: 

This year’s additions include:

Chocolate-Champagne Truffles, courtesy of Martha Stewart’s recipe (I’ll roll mine in gold sanding sugar):

And Individual Chocolate Avocado Mousse from Giada De Laurentiis:

Now on to the savories.  At the main table, I’ll have one of my Oscar Party standards: Spanakopita 

Hummus Three Ways: White, Roasted Pine Nut and Black Bean served with crudities and pita chip ribbons: 

Greek Cucumber Cups, thank you Rachael Ray:  Ginger Soy Chicken Mini Kabobs:

Rosemary Balsamic Mini Kabobs:

Antipasta Skewers Two Ways: Italian and Greek Style:

Then over to the coffee table in the prime time TV viewing location.  Guess what?  I’ll put more food there too!  Starting with Paula Deen’s Sugar and Nut Glazed Brie served with fresh sliced pears:

Classic, can’t live without Dill Dip with Crudités

and finally to round out the table, Cheese, Crackers and Grapes.

But Oscar Party isn’t completed without it’s signature cocktail…..the Twisted Cosmo!

So friends, I hope you’re seriously hungry ’cause I’m already cooking up a storm!  I’ve pinned all these to my Oscar Party board on Pinterest along with a few other party ideas in case you’re planning your own shindig.

–Martta

Harry Potter Food!

Well now that you already know how I did the Sorcerer’s Stone Jell-o, here is the rest of our menu for our big Harry Potter movie viewing party: 

We made our desserts first.  Pretzel rods dipped in chocolate and rolled in sprinkles of all kinds for the wands. Then owl feed, which turned out to be SUPER addictive!  It was a traditional white trash snack mix.  Man do I love those Wheat Thins Stix!  And finally on to our pièce de résistance: Dragon chicken with dragon egg grapes and forbidden forrest broccoli. 

The kids love their dragon chicken with ranch dressing so I simply mixed the ranch dressing with food coloring to come up with dragon “wings” and fire breathing.  They loved it!  Caroline especially liked the fact that she could mix all the colors and turn her ranch dressing brown.  

Then to cap off our Harry Potter movie fest, a traditional glass of butterbeer for everyone!  Yum!  

I’ve tried a lot of butterbeer recipes and this one is my favorite.  Although, I don’t add the rum extract and I dash in some butterscotch schnapps for the adults.  Yum!

–Martta

Hummus Three Ways

One of the new treats I tried out for this year’s Oscar Party was hummus three ways.  I figure if the gurus on Top Chef can have all their dishes three ways, why can’t I?  And I do think it turned out sensational (if I do say so myself). 

To make this hummus extravaganza happen, I picked up votives at Ace Mart for a little under $0.50 a piece.  Heather contributed black bean hummus (which she’ll have to blog in the future), Costco contributed a tub of Sabra’s roasted pine nut hummus and I made a batch of Giada’s white bean hummus – my version is always heavy on the parsley.

Chop veggies in sticks.  For the black bean hummus I had carrots and celery (I did spring for the extra effort of chopping whole carrots so they would be tall enough in the glasses) and for the roasted pine nut hummus, baby cucumber spears.  I followed the directions for Giada’s pita chips but rather than cut the pitas into triangle shapes, I created sticks by cutting strips of pitas then cutting the strips in half.  They fit perfectly into the small votive glasses and were the perfect tool for scooping out yummy hummus!

To make sure the edges of the glasses stayed clean, we pipped the hummus into each cup – it’s faster and easier than cleaning edges!  All the types were a taste sensation and the little cups were all gone by the time the party was over.  I can’t wait to try this again next year!

–Martta