Snack dishes should be beautiful in presentation, tasty, and most importantly - very mouth-watering. Their task is not so much to saturate as to stimulate appetite and delight the eye.
If the hostess serves unusual snacks on the table, they will be tried first.
Fancy Snacks - General Cooking Principles
Ease and speed of preparation distinguish snack foods from the main ones. The usual time for solving such a culinary task is 15 minutes. But if it comes to unusual snacks, the process can take up to 40 minutes.
Any products are suitable, no restrictions. Shrimps, fish, meat, ham, eggs, eggplant, mushrooms, various cheeses are ideal for creating a snack dish. Delivery depends only on the experience and desire of the hostess. You can fry, bake, cook souffle and aspic - there is where to show culinary imagination.
Pancake bags with salmon
The highlight of this appetizer is sweet pancakes, the taste of which is in harmony with salted salmon. Beautiful serving and hearty filling make the festive table setting original.
Ingredients:
• half a liter of milk;
• three hundred grams of flour;
• two eggs;
• a tablespoon of sugar;
• half a teaspoon of salt;
• a tablespoon of vegetable oil;
• fifty milliliters of cream;
• two hundred grams of slightly salted red fish;
• a bunch of green onions.
Cooking method:
Make pancake dough by mixing milk, flour, sugar, salt, eggs.
Let the dough stand for about fifteen minutes, then fry the pancakes.
Prepare the filling. Wipe the cottage cheese through a sieve and put in a bowl with high sides.
Pour the cream into the curd mass and whip everything in an air souffle.
Cut the fish into small cubes.
Put in cottage cheese and mix well.
In the center of the pancake, put a tablespoon of curd filling, collect the edges and bandage the base of the "bag" with the onion arrow.
Before serving, preheat an unusual snack in the oven or microwave and serve hot.
Profiteroles with cream cheese and salmon
Delicate, creamy, piquant profiteroles will decorate any holiday table. This unusual snack is a real treat for gourmets. It’s easy to cook, but the process takes a lot of time.
Ingredients:
• 120 grams of butter;
• 130 ml of water;
• 160 ml of milk;
• 160 grams of flour;
• a teaspoon of salt;
• a teaspoon of sugar;
• four large eggs (or five small);
• three hundred grams of cream cheese;
• a piece of salmon weighing two hundred grams;
• lemon peel.
Cooking method:
Pour water and milk into the stewpan, put butter, sugar and salt.
Put on fire and bring to a boil.
After boiling the mixture, add flour.
Constantly stirring, boil the mass over low heat for six to seven minutes.
Put the hot mass in a cup.
Beat the dough with a mixer until it is warm.
Add eggs in small portions.
The result is a pleasant, ductile, viscous mass.
Preheat the oven to 175 ° C.
Put the dough in the nozzle - a pastry syringe.
Cover the baking sheet with baking paper.
Drop small balls of dough the size of a walnut. The distance between future profiteroles is 3-4 cm.
Put in the preheated oven for half an hour.
Scald lemon with boiling water, wipe and remove zest.
Cream cheese mix with zest.
Transfer the creamy mass to the pastry syringe.
Cut the salmon with transparent plates.
Air profiteroles cool and cut in half.
At the bottom of the resulting "cup" (bottom), put a slice of fish.
Dip cream cheese on top.
Cover the top with profiteroles.
Serve the dish to the festive table.
Egg-cheese "lakes"
Of all the unusual snacks, this one is the simplest and fastest to prepare. A little bread, eggs, cheese, that's all that is needed for a culinary experiment. The amount of ingredients is indicated in five servings.
Ingredients:
• ten pieces of white bread with a thickness of at least 1 cm;
• five eggs;
• one hundred grams of semi-hard cheese;
• salt;
• two tablespoons of butter.
Cooking method:
Turn on the oven 180 degrees.
Rub cheese into small crumbs.
In the center of five slices of bread, make a circle 3-4 cm in diameter.
Grease whole slices of bread with butter.
Put bread with a middle cut on them.
Gently hammer a raw egg into the recess, salt.
Spread cheese crumbs on the edge of the egg "lake".
Bake eggs on a wire rack or baking sheet until cooked. For the yolk to remain liquid, it takes about five to six minutes.
Sicilian bruschetta with eggplant
The spicy taste of eggplant makes them an ideal base for a variety of familiar and unusual snacks. Bruschetta stuffed with "blue" has a wonderful sweet taste.
Ingredients:
• kilogram of eggplant;
• bell pepper;
• five tomatoes (you can take ten cherry);
• one hundred grams of pitted olives;
• four tablespoons of pine nuts;
• two cloves of garlic;
• a tablespoon of raisins;
• a tablespoon of capers;
• five leaves of fresh basil (or a tablespoon of dried);
• a teaspoon of wine vinegar (red);
• a tablespoon of sugar;
• salt and pepper to taste;
• olive oil;
• fresh baguette or white bread.
Cooking method:
Cut eggplant into cubes, add salt and leave for ten minutes.
Rinse the eggplant, let the water drain, squeeze the juice thoroughly.
Cut the pepper into squares or strips.
Fill capers with cold water.
Peel large tomatoes, cut them into pieces.
Heat oil in a pan, fry slices of pepper.
Put pepper on a disposable paper towel to make glass oil.
Fry the eggplant in several portions. They must lie in a pan in one layer, otherwise they will be stewed, not fried.
Add vegetables when frying.
At the end, fry the chopped garlic.
After a minute, throw tomato slices, pine nuts, olives, capers, raisins into the pan.
Sprinkle everything with sugar and simmer for about ten minutes under a closed lid, reducing the heat to a minimum.
Put the fried eggplant cubes, peppers and basil in the pan.
Pour vinegar, pepper, simmer under the lid for another ten minutes.
Turn off the heat and let the vegetable mass stand for three to four minutes.
Cut the bread or baguette into slices and grill.
Put eggplant stuffing on each slice of bread.
Garnish the bruschetta with a basil leaf.
Caesar on a skewer
Want to try a popular salad in an unusual serving? Cook it according to this recipe. Surprise the guests: they will remember such "Caesar" for a long time.
Ingredients:
• romaine lettuce leaves (about 150 grams);
• a teaspoon of finely chopped dill;
• two hundred grams of boiled chicken breast;
• one hundred grams of cherry tomatoes;
• one hundred grams of white bread;
• thirty grams of parmesan (you can take another hard cheese);
• clove of garlic.
Appetizer Sauce:
• two tablespoons of olive oil;
• three tablespoons of mayonnaise;
• three tablespoons of unsweetened natural yogurt;
• a teaspoon of Dijon mustard;
• twenty grams of anchovies;
• ten grams of capers;
• ten grams of parmesan.
Cooking method:
Cut the garlic in half lengthwise and grate the bread.
Preheat the pan without oil.
Cut the bread into identical cubes.
Sprinkle bread with olive oil and lightly fry it on both sides (one minute on each side).
Add dill, a pinch of salt and black pepper to the pan, mix and turn off the heat.
Cut the boiled chicken into small, neat cubes.
Grate the cheese on a fine grater.
Cut lettuce leaves into long strips.
Fold the ingredients for the sauce in a blender and beat thoroughly. You can make it a mixer.
Take the wooden skewer skewers and string the prepared ingredients on them: cherry, lettuce, chicken cube, a slice of bread, again lettuce, fried filet and cherry.
Put the skewers in a wide salad bowl and pour the sauce.
Greek Mushroom Appetizer
Fragrant snack will decorate the table. Mushrooms, saffron, garlic, orange jam - there is something to surprise guests!
Ingredients:
• seven hundred grams of real forest mushrooms (fresh);
• thirty grams of dried porcini mushrooms;
• two hundred grams of natural yogurt;
• two red onions;
• two cloves of garlic;
• three stigmas of saffron;
• a pinch of thyme;
• fresh parsley to taste;
• a quarter cup of olive oil;
• a tablespoon of orange jam;
• a glass of boiling water;
• two tablespoons of brandy;
• salt and black pepper to taste.
Cooking method:
Dissolve cognac, jam and a pinch of salt in a glass of boiling water.
Pour the solution with white dried mushrooms, leave for half an hour.
Squeeze the mushrooms and cut into small pieces. Do not pour out the solution.
Slice fresh forest mushrooms.
Chop parsley and garlic with a knife.
Cut the onions in half rings.
In well-heated oil, fry the onion rings.
Add mushrooms, garlic, thyme, mix and fry without a lid.
After two minutes, pour in the mushroom infusion, sprinkle with parsley and simmer for half an hour under the lid.
Season with pepper and salt.
Saffron brew a spoon of boiling water.
Ten minutes later, mix the saffron infusion with yogurt and leftover butter.
Pour the sauce into the mushroom roast, mix and serve.
The appetizer is good and cold.
Eggplant mousse with aioli sauce
Piquant taste and unusual serving are worth it to cook eggplant according to this recipe.
Ingredients:
• six eggplants;
• four hundred grams of olives;
• a bunch of parsley;
• oil for the pan;
• salt pepper.
Aioli sauce
• one egg;
• one yolk;
• a glass of vegetable oil (250 ml);
• a tablespoon of mustard;
• a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar;
• half a teaspoon of pepper;
• a teaspoon of sugar;
• a teaspoon of salt.
Cooking method:
Beat the ingredients for the sauce first with half the norm of sugar. When the mass becomes homogeneous, pour in the remaining oil and hammer in again until a thick emulsion is obtained.
Set aside three olives, turn the rest into pasta in a blender.
Cut the stems from the parsley, and add the leaves to the blender and mash too.
In the resulting olive paste, add 2 tablespoons of aioli sauce, mix.
Cut the eggplants into halves, sprinkle the peel with oil and bake in the oven.
Beat the eggplant in a blender with salt and pepper.
Add aioli. Put the sauce to taste, not necessarily use the whole.
Put the eggplant mousse in the glasses.
Top with olive cream.
Garnish with halves of whole olives and stalks of parsley.
Fancy Snacks - Tricks and Tips
Pancake bags can be filled in different ways. Delicious filling can be prepared from ham and cheese, mushrooms and whipped cream, meat, chicken. A good idea is to put inside a salad, for example, from crab sticks.
You can tie pancakes not only with onions, but also with sprigs of parsley or a braided “pigtail” of cheese.
Serve snacks immediately after cooking, so they will be tastier. Do not store snack foods in the refrigerator for more than a day. They will lose attractiveness, become unappetizing.
