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+++ categories = ["food"] date = 2024-12-20T10:30:00Z description = "" draft = false slug = "2024-christmas-eve-appetizer-party" title = "🎄2024 Christmas Eve Party Appetizers" author = "nicholas" +++
The trick is to select a food that will stay viable through the 2 hour drive, plus the interim time after it is finished being prepared (Some amount of built-in margin for unexpected delays is prudent). Without catering tools this is surprisingly difficult, especially for someone probably too concerned about food-borne illnesses. This is a dark but comforting thought: if someone(s) did get sick it is unlikely that they would be able to determine the offending food. The sample size is small, hopefully especially small for those who did develop the illness. Plenty of plausible deniability since they probably ate other foods too.
Basically, we need to choose a food based on two criteria:
- How well the food "keeps", i.e. how well the freshness, texture, flavor, and overall quality is preserved after being prepared and stored
- How well the food "travels", i.e. durability, food-safe temperature requirements, etc.
Pretzel Nuggets
We made pretzel nuggets and traditional beer cheese for a family Christmas Eve gathering. We made two variations of the pretzel nuggets: plan (salted), and cinnamon sugar.
Cinnamon Sugar ★★★☆☆
This one was disappointing, the sugars eventually dissolved and made a sticky syrup which ruined the look. This was probably made worse by applying the sugar too soon, while the nuggets were still warm and moisture was still rapidly migrating to the surface, acting as a solvent for the sugar. They still tasted excellent.
Plain (salted) ★★★★☆
These were very good, if a little stale by the time they were eaten ~4 hours later, but this is to be expected for a baked product containing no fat and high surface area-to-volume ratio. This must be part of why Auntie Anne's prefers to bake pretzels "on demand" (duh).
Beer Cheese ★★☆☆☆
My poor opinion of this recipe and resultant food depends much on the selection of ingredients and preparation. The beer we selected was too bitter, and temperature of the cheese was too low (room temperature). It became grainy and sludge-like because it was thickened with flour. Since I did not have any tested recipes that would fill the need for pretzel dip, I was aiming to be traditional by picking a traditional beer cheese recipe, thinking that if it was traditional it would be well-tested and good having survived many years. Next time I will just melt down some American cheese into a pot of milk with mega-brand beer and this will probably be superior.
Beer
{{< image src="images/piney-river-missouri-mule-ipa.PNG" caption="Missouri Mule IPA" >}}
I do not know much about beer, and what I do know is not quite relevant to drinking it, or consuming it otherwise, so I am not in a position to evaluate the quality of the beer I selected. I am however, able to evaluate the subjective elements of a beer, namely taste (it was bad). It smelled odd, and it left a bad aftertaste. Apparently the beer is made with filtered water sourced from a well. This is marketed as "Ozarks water".
“We’ve always had excellent Ozarks water to capture our sense of ‘place’ in our beer, and we’ve used locally harvested and grown ingredients in some beers, too”
— Brian Durham, Founder & Owner Piney River Brewing Co.
I read their site for one minute and already I see what they are trying to do and I do not like it. Their marketing is not built for me. "...capture our sense of 'place'...". I insist that that "place" was a barnyard. I am sick to death of the kitschy pretentiousness, of their gimmicks and their saccharine anemoia.
Other appetizers attending
- stuffed mushroom
- cheese balls, various
- pineapple upside down cake
- pig in a blanket
- spinach roll-ups
- shrimp
- little smokies
- chocolate pie
- chick-fil-a nuggets
- etc.
Ideas for next time
- Quiche - Caramelized Onion, Bacon, Cheese
- Christmas Focaccia