Resident foodie Katy Hofstede-Smith runs us through some top tips for Christmas entertaining, plus we share some cocktail and canapé recipes to get you started.
Christmas is without doubt the season for entertaining. Roaring fires, the welcoming smell of mulling spices and festive cheer with friends and family. However, being the ‘hostess with the mostess’ can take its toll, with the seemingly endless tasks of planning, cooking, clearing and cleaning to get through. If you’re like me, you probably always take on just a little too much, ending the festive period thoroughly exhausted. But entertaining, either on a whim or for planned groups throughout Christmas, doesn’t need to be a chore; your secret weapon: canapés!
When planning canapés for a drinks party you want something to make people talk, but for all of the right reasons, so think substantial, stand out and seasonal. Mini jacket potatoes topped with sour cream, bacon pieces and chopped chives, baby homemade beef burgers or toad in the hole made in mini muffin tins with cocktail sausages are all great meat-based canapés. For vegetarian options, how about making some mini spinach and cheese muffins, mushroom arancini (fried risotto balls) stuffed with mozzarella or goats cheese and onion chutney filo parcels?
Top tips for Christmas entertaining:
- Send an invitation. Clear start and finish times will help to manage your guests’ expectations and may allow them to plan around your timings with childcare, present-wrapping or other invitations.
- Don’t scrimp on the canapés. Aim to serve at least six canapés per guest, to ensure that the drinks don’t have too much of an effect.
- Swap a starter for canapés. If you can’t have Christmas without the traditional prawn cocktail starter, why not incorporate this with a small spoon of prawn cocktail served in a baby gem lettuce leaf? Softly boiled quails eggs (these can be bought ready cooked), half peeled and served dipped into a little celery salt, are delicious and nature’s perfect bite-size canapé. Or, make individual mini cheese scones in advance and serve them warmed and halved with some blue cheese and fig.
- Keep it simple. Not only will it make your life easier but your guests will appreciate it along with the glut of other festive treats on offer. Choose canapés that are easy to prepare in advance, easy to serve and easy to eat.
- Plan ahead. This doesn’t mean that you can’t accommodate last minute visitors – quite the opposite. By planning in advance and having a few key ingredients at hand, you can be ready to go with some tasty canapés in a flash. Shop-bought puff pastry can quickly be turned into some very tasty homemade sausage rolls with a little bit of extra good quality sausage meat from your butcher, or tasty stilton bites by cooking it with a chunk of blue cheese inside.
- Bottoms up. Make sure that you have a range of drinks to offer guests which work alongside your chosen canapés. If you fancy serving mulled wine, cider or apple juice, then miniature mince pies are great. For substantial seasonal canapés, like those suggested, a full bodied wintry red wine or artisan beer will work well. For the elegant Christmas Day suggestions, you can’t beat a crisp glass of champagne or prosecco. If you want to make things a little more exciting there are some fabulous easy cocktails that you can make such as a sloe gin fizz (a shot of sloe gin, squeeze of lemon juice, dash of cream soda to fill the glass and teaspoon of sugar syrup) or a golden kiss (shot of chocolate vodka topped with champagne).
Hopefully, with a bit of help finding easier ways to entertain this Christmas with a little less effort, you’ll get through the festive period with a little more cheer! Happy Christmas hosting.
Katy