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Need ideas for a retro snack


jende

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I'm having a good old fashioned poker party this weekend and everyone is bringing a snack. I'm sure there will be lots of bags of potato chips and some of my more domestic friends are baking, but I want to make a quintessential retro card-game snack, the kind of thing my parents would've had at their parties in the 70s -- I just don't know yet what that is.

I was thinking of something along the lines of pigs in a blanket. There are definitely extra points for the trashy factor, but I want it to taste good too. Who's got ideas?

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The Original Chex Mix!

Deviled Eggs

Some kind of hot canape, like something cheesy/oniony/mayonaissey mounded on little round melba toasts.

Cheese olives...

That's what I got off the top of my head.

I read a lot of old cookbooks.

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If you can find the small "entertaining" breads, you can top them with a couple of different cream cheese based spreads, run them under the broiler, and have a good snack that's reminiscent of 50's-60's card parties but still tastes great.

I like cream cheese and crabmeat, mixed with minced green onions, salt and pepper. Curry powder if you like that. Or cream cheese and smoked salmon and dill. Or minced ham and Gruyere, mixed with a little mustard and just enough cream cheese to make it spreadable.

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The Original Chex Mix!

Deviled Eggs

Some kind of hot canape, like something cheesy/oniony/mayonaissey mounded on little round melba toasts.

Cheese olives...

That's what I got off the top of my head. 

I read a lot of old cookbooks.

What are cheese olives?

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fondue!

swedish meatballs and other things in crockpots! (cocktail weenies or something)

guacamole and other assorted dips were huge - anything that involved a flavor packet (ranch dressing, onion soup mix)

my mom used to make some sort of veggie pizza that involved something like pillsbury crescent dough spread with cream chese and herbs topped with raw veggies (don't ask - it was the 70's, right?)

and if you are feeling super ambitious (and maybe want to frighten guests), check out some of the "recipes" from weight watchers (sorry, this site puts me in tears every time): http://www.candyboots.com/wwcards.html

alright, so maybe these suggestions won't help much. but it amused me!

have fun!

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I'm not sure if these began in the 70's or were just carryovers from the 60's but I remember sausage balls a la Bisquick, and yes dammit, I like them, SO THERE! :raz:

Anyway, the ones I had were most likely made from this recipe and was taken from the original Bisquick recipe on the back of the box. Or you could use Bisquick's current, more "fancified" recipe from their website.

I like the original best. :biggrin:

Inside me there is a thin woman screaming to get out, but I can usually keep the Bitch quiet: with CHOCOLATE!!!

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Every party I went to back then had Hawaiian Sweet and Sour Meatballs. As I recall they were meatballs that you then put in a sweet and sour sauce made from canned pineapple chuncks, diced green peppers, the pineapple juice, soy sauce, vinegar and cornstarch. However I went to Hawaii in the seventies and never saw this anywhere. Go figure.

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manly man food, like pickled herring, and limburgher cheese.....

cigars........

bourbon....

anything so that when the guys go home, their wives know they've been to a card game and not a strip joint.....

cold cuts, kielbasa, stuff you can put on a cracker and a cocktail napkin w/out needing a plate, things you can eat while playing a hand......

freshen your drink, get a cold beer and throw down a few shrimp w/ some really hot cocktail sauce.......

imagine, no girls allowed, just the guys playing cards and telling decadent stories from their youth......

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Has anyone mentioned Ham Biscuits? this is just one version.

Here's a photo.

Or it can be as simple as this.

I think these have been a popular snack for all types of parties in the south for generations. I always prepared them for parties in the 60s and 70s (as well as the 80s - or until the low-fat propaganda became so universal) and have resurrected them a few times in the past couple of years. They are usually the first snack to disappear.

Edited by andiesenji (log)

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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Two things come to mind, cheese ball covered in chopped nuts w/ Triscuits and cherry tomatoes cored and stuffed with cooked chopped bacon and a shot of tabasco.

Oh then there's the old standby og lil smokies in BBQ sauce.

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Hot pepper-jack cheese made its appearance in sliced form, alongside American and "Swiss" in the mid-'70s and was immediately taken up by the party snack crowd.

A slice of pepper jack was stacked on a slice of ham (the chopped and formed stuff in a square) or other square lunch meat and rolled into a cylinder, stabbed with a series of toothpicks and cut into small "wheels." They were arranged nicely on plates or trays or were stabbed into a whole pineapple, making its appearance as a centerpiece. (The pineapple had to be speared first with an icepick to make the holes for the picks.)

Occasionally condiments for dipping (mustard or ketchup, etc.,) were spooned into the small disposable pleated-paper nut cups that are so difficult to find now, however the smallest size of water "dispenser" cups can be substituted if you want to go this far. These are also handy for serving nuts and other small nibbles, particularly if one wants to keep fingers a bit cleaner.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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Mind you, I was all but fetal at the time :wink: but the Swedish meatballs were definitely extremely high on the list. Party rye, my friends. Little sangwidges made with party rye! Laughing Cow cheese cubes. Pretzel sticks.

You must call your drinks highballs and they must come in that glass. Short thick glasses with thick bottoms. I have a set of striped highball glasses I would poke someone's eyes out to protect.

If you use higher glasses, use drink stirrers with whistles hanging on them -- whistle for another drink.

Highballs and party rye. Wow. That was a time.

I like to bake nice things. And then I eat them. Then I can bake some more.

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Devon (bologna) wrapped around mashed potato and secured with a toothpick. If you were feeling really fancy, chopped parsley on the ends of the roll.

I'm not sure if this is just an Aussie thing or not, but mum made these until well into the 80's. She was always a little bit resistant to change.

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The Original Chex Mix!

Deviled Eggs

Some kind of hot canape, like something cheesy/oniony/mayonaissey mounded on little round melba toasts.

Cheese olives...

That's what I got off the top of my head. 

I read a lot of old cookbooks.

What are cheese olives?

As I recall, it's a pimento olive wrapped in some kind of cheese pastry flaky stuff, and baked. I'm a child of the 80's, myself, so I'm just going on what my mom liked and what I find in my vintage cookbooks.

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Mmm, country ham biscuits. I always associate them with North Carolina because that's the only place I've encountered them. Whenever we visit the family up there, they seem to magically appear on the breakfast table. And it's got be extra salty funky country ham too...with a good chew to it. Yum.

As for retro snacks, the little mini reubens are both retro and delicious. And hell, who doesn't love a good pupu platter, complete with rumaki and tiny little Tiki lamps?

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Onion dip. Celery stuffed with Paminna cheese. Bugles stuffed with Cheese-in-a-can. Cheese puffs/crab puffs.

Shrimp mold---the one involving tomato soup, cream cheese and a fish-shaped Jello mold.

Shrimp toast. Party rye with corned beef topped with Durkee's and stuck under the broiler.

Edam in the red wax cut like a tulip, the cheese taken out, mixed with other stuff, and put back in.

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My parents had card parties in the 70's, and since I was the oldest, I got to "help". Here are some of the things I remember them serving:

Crab dip. One step up from onion dip. I know there was sour cream, paprika, and flaked crab meat in it, but darned if I know what else was in there. It was markedly runnier than onion dip.

Cheese puffs. Cheese, flour, and a tbsp or water to make a very thick dough. Rolled into balls and then baked. I remember these well because I HATED rolling them.

Water chestnuts wrapped in bacon, brushed with soy sauce, and then broiled.

Cheese balls. I think these might have been premade, because I remember the vivid artificial "port wine" red swirls through them, but there's no reason a little real port and some red food coloring couldn't be used to simulate it!

Liver pate on either crackers or small bread pieces. I remember this because I hated liver, but loved the pate, and I could not reconcile the two in my head.

But what I remember most was a tray of appetizers (don't remember exactly what) that my mother had prepared and put in the fridge. She was in the middle of a hand and asked me to put them under the broiler. She didn't tell me to take the plastic wrap off the tray first.

Fortunately, the wrap didn't melt over everything, it kind of just shrunk. Hey, I was just a kid and didn't know it wasn't heat proof!

Marcia.

Don't forget what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he wanted...he lived happily ever after. -- Willy Wonka

eGullet foodblog

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