Appetizers for Up to 100

They're are easy to make and they are easy to eat.

It’s a slightly sweet appetizer that works well with beer. They pair fine with white burgundy, white that has a little angsty depth works better than say, a cheerful thing from Alsace . Fried wontons are bar food and sometimes a beer and fried wontons are exactly what the day requires.

You need 1 lb. of roasted sweet potato for 40 wontons.
Three Tbsp of glutenous rice flour.
One scallion, minced
A tbsp of Tabasco
A dash of cinnamon
Salt

Mix together with ardent conviction (you want the glutens to feel alive) and let sit for a day.

Place mixture in a piping bag and pipe two teaspoons of sweet potato into the center of each wonton skin.

Seal (use a beaten egg or water) and pinch tight.

Deep fry and serve with a Red Chili sauce.

I wish I had a photo of these, they are the most adorable tasty little guys you can serve. You can make them Big Pork Sandwiches as a main course but small pork sandwiches make the kind of appetizer that a cocktail party requires.

People tend to drink when they are uncomfortable and drunk uncomfortable people are the bane of any event. On many occasion this pork sandwich has come to the rescue. It is also one of Erik's most requested recipes.

Heat the Oven at 350°
Heat the Oven at 350°

Cut 4lbs of pork butt into 2 inch cubes
(leave the fat on)

Marinade:
Annato paste 2 Tbsp
cumin 1 tsp
paprika 2 Tbsp
thyme 1 tsp
oregano 1 tsp
black pepper 1 tsp
salt 2 Tbsp
garlic 4 cloves
onion 1/2 cup
jalapenos with seeds 4 to 8
(your choice for spice)
beer 1/2 can
orange juice from 1
lime juice from 1

All the marinade ingredients go into a blender. Make smooth.

Pour onto pork and let sit: overnight.

Line a roasting pan with the banana leaves and place the pork in the center, cover with the leaves and foil and into the oven. After 3 hours check the meat. The pork will be ready when the meat easily breaks apart. When this happens remove from the oven, let cool. When the pork is cool enough to handle by hand, but not yet cool, shred with a couple of forks.
We serve them with coleslaw a little mayo and carolina sauce.

Star Anise Beef on Curried Onions with Sultana Chutney

Did you know that, according to the USDA, Americans eat an average of 200 pounds of meat per year? Mark Bitman of the New York Times wrote that the average American consumes 8 ounces of meat per day.

WHAT?

Then I watched people eat at our catering gigs.

Peoples Loves the Beefs.

The only thing they love more than beef is shrimp.

This appetizer allows people to get their beef fix and move on. For 100 people and to make one crostini per guest, you need 3 pounds of beef plus that extra pound for spillage/burning insurance.

A note of warning, we don't use measurements for this particular dish. You're on your own there.

First:
Marinate the beef in a combination of soy, rice vinegar, star anise, pepper, salt and garlic. Let sit for 24 hours.

Roast off your beef to 120 and let sit for at least a day.

Slice

Curried Onions:
Julienne the onions and slow cook them. Add yellow curry and salt.

Sultana Chutney Ingredients
Garlic cloves
Minced gingerroot
1 cup golden raisin
cumin
cayenne
vinegar

Cook gently. Let rest for a day.

A baguette will give you about 50 slices, a little more if you have a sharp bread knife.
Baste slices with an oil and butter combination and toast.

Just before serving, build your crostini — Curried onion first, beef slice and chutney. Top with something green.

Not all of us like fishcakes. Some of us recall the processed fish of our childhood and the smell of flaccid sticks of violated mystery swimmers served on plastic school cafeteria trays; the air sour with dirty bleach water; the lunch lady corpulent with the small children she ate for breakfast.

Then there's the evening aroma of an oven pre-heating and the internal battle between hunger and reluctance that comes with freezer burn on waxy boxes. Fish = childhood angst.

When it comes to lumps of fish it doesn't matter how you dress them up; there are going to be those who will turn and run at the sight of seafood all mashed up into a ball and reheated.

I am one such person.

Erik, being an Italian Viking Chef, loves fish. He grew up with what most of us who don’t like fish missed as kids — fish prepared by people who like fish. His recipe, a take on one he learned at the CIA, is excellent and, I have to say, if I am going to eat a fishcake, I’ll eat his.

Mix:
1 lb white fish poached and crumbled.
1 lb cooked and riced potatoes

Add:
½ cup chopped basil
2 globs of mayonnaise to moisten the mixture
2 tsp mustard
Breadcrumbs to bind the mixture
Salt, pepper and Tabasco for seasoning

Use a melon baller to make a one-ounce fishcake.

Fry 2 minutes per side and finish in the oven for 2 more minutes.

Garnish with something cute and approachable.

Proportions:
If wishes were fishes, I’d have these puppies a little smaller than one ounce. They’d be easier to cook all the way through (cold fishy centers only reinforce fishstick trauma).

This recipe makes 30 one-ounce fishcakes. You can stretch that number with amounts above. Also, unless you are serving a bunch of Italian Vikings, not everyone is going to eat a couple of these guys. I’d count on maybe 60% of your guests trying one. Their loss.

Appetizers are never a "just". They take more time than an entreé because one must make more of them. Appetizers need to fit the event as well. An intimate sit down dinner merits an intricate appetizer, while a party for 100 requires easy-to-plate bites that people can eat while standing up and drinking and talking.

The hunt for new, interesting appetizers is constant. For the next week, we’ll be featuring our favorites starting with simple recipes suited for large parties and moving onto the most involved.

First up: Roasted New Potatoes and Blue Cheese

Ingredients:
New Potatoes
Blue Cheese
Cream
Chives

One note before you go shopping- use the cheap and cheerful blue cheese. There isn’t much point in using Italian gorgonzola or French Bleu d'Auvergne. They bitter out when combined with cream. Use something domestic. Chef Cannella uses an Oregon blue — which is laid back and easy to work with. You will need a pound.

Buy potatoes about the size of a golf ball. This is a one-bite appetizer and people get weird when they start to choke. For 100 people get four pounds, you’ll have extra.

Do a day ahead:
Cut the potatoes in half and use a melon baller to make a hole in the center.
Boil in one-pound batches.

Make blue cheese filling by mixing cheese with cream.

Depending on the cheese you’ll need to mix in anywhere from a tablespoon to four. Watch the consistency, it should be a little thicker than frosting.

Keep in mind the blue cheese will melt in the roasted potatoes and will stiffen in a refrigerator. Put mixture into the piping bag and refrigerate.


At a half hour before serving time:
Let the piping bag sit somewhere to warm (but not melt)
Roast the potatoes until they are golden brown.
Let cool on a sheet pan.
Pipe cheese.
Garnish with chives.

You can garnish with anything you like, but make sure whatever it is won’t wilt in the heat of warm blue cheese.