Healthy HOSTING
To compete with the beloved cheeseball and crab dip, working healthier options into a holiday cocktail party requires strategy. Here’s how:
When assembling a cheeseboard, use whole-grain bread and crackers and offer a few lower-fat cheeses such as chèvre and Cantenaar.
Skip the sad crudités platter from the supermarket, and assemble a tempting cornucopia of colourful heirloom carrots, radishes with their tops and barely blanched sugar snap peas.
To get more veggies on the menu, offer a spread of Italian vegetable antipasto or some of the wonderful vegetarian mezes dishes from the Middle East.
Instead of baguette, use cucumber slices, endive spears or small lettuce cups as the base for canapés.
Serve a few steamed hors d’oeuvres such as edamame or these fabulous Kim Chi Mun Doo dumplings, and present them dim-sum style in a bamboo basket.