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December 27, 2006

Party food: Fat Balls, dips, quiche, caviar and fondue

Still on vacation...

Fat Balls: Despite their name, the only fat in these cookie balls with dried fruit comes from two eggs -- and the oil they're fried in. Recipe: Oliebollen (fat balls) from The Grand Rapids (Mich.) Press.

Dips: We used organic packaged dip mixed with sour cream on Christmas, and were underwhelmed. Penitent, we're back to scratch. The first two appeal to me, and may grace the Pats-Titans game here Sunday.

All in one story (Delectable dips) at the Manitowoc (Wis.) Herald Times Reporter: Caramelized Onion Dip, Sun-Dried Tomato Basil Dip, Spicy Stone-Ground Honey Mustard Dip, Bonnie's Sweet Mustard Dip.

Spinach quiche: You can take the high road or the low with these two recipes, both found at the Helena (Mont.) Independent Record. The first, from Go Greek without the guilt, Crustless Spinach Quiche, uses nonfat milk and "Makes 8 servings, each about 125 calories and 6 grams fat."

There's no calorie or fat information with this next one. Use your imagination. It's Ring in the quiche: Meat and Spinach New Year’s Quiche. Pictured above, it uses bacon, sausage, sour cream, heavy cream or half and half...

Black caviar and smoked salmon with egg, red onion, lemon and sour cream.

Poor man's New Year's Eve caviar: True caviar is sturgeon eggs, with Beluga going for $150 an ounce, but here's a knockoff that will pass in my unexalted circle. Romanoff makes red lumpfish caviar, and golden or black whitefish caviar, that can be had in small jars at many markets for about $2.50 an ounce, in 2-oz jars. They offer great art possibilities.

A traditional presentation of caviar includes toast points, crème fraiche (or sour cream -- we're pretending here), chopped shallot (or red onion), chopped boiled egg and tiny lemon wedges. The flavor is very strong and salty, so you don't need much caviar -- use a half-teaspoon plus the goodies above per toast point, and let those with stronger palates add more. Indeed, you might include thin smoked salmon slices for those who like the idea and the accompaniments but not the caviar.

Or you could make a molded Russian Caviar Mousse with golden "caviar." (I made it with red roe once, and it was a pleasant pink color.) The recipe calls for two 1.75-oz. jars, so save a half-ounce from two jars for decorating the unmolded mousse.

All go splendidly with champagne. Or whatever you're serving in those flutes.

Fondue: Fondue Savoyarde (Cheese) -- using gruyère, beaufort and comté -- from Chocolate and Zucchini, the elegant Parisian food blog.

From the Toronto Guelph Mercury, "...Authentic fondue from Switzerland. It is from 'Cooking with Booze' by Jennings and David Steele (Whitecap)." Uses Emmenthal and Gruyère.

This is nearly identical to Epicurious's Cheese Fondue, but there are other fondue recipes there as well.

Posted by Sheila Lennon  at 2:58 PM | Permalink