Get out your flutes and your bubbly, it’s hors d’oeurvres time! (Look out for a flute roundup this week to make your swanktastic party complete.)
Without further a-dew, your roundup:
Newcomer I tell you what… joins the fray this months with Monica’s onion tarlets from the Friends cookbook. As I always says, onions + pastry = no way to go wrong.
Let us not judge too harshly the fact that someone actually owns and uses the Friends cookbook; we all have cookbook skeletons in the closet <cough Paula Deen cough>. We will judge only with a moderate degree of harshness, for we are magnanimous. And we love onion tarts.
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Always-dependable participant Robin of A Little Greener Every Day jumps into the fray with this White Bean-Horseradish spread from Recipes from an Ecological Kitchen
Dip may be my favorite food groups, and white beans are a great palate. Beware, however, this sentence in her description: “But once those ten hours or so are over, it’s a quick and easy recipe.”
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I’m not the only dip-lover in these parts. Eatingclub Vancouver used the The America’s Test Kitchen Family Cookbook
There was some cheating here, but if we’re not going to judge the Friends cookbook people, we shouldn’t judge here either. Plus: radishes! Who doesn’t love ’em?
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Erika shares my problem: too many cookbooks. Too many magazines too, as these garlic-stuffed mushrooms came from a 2006 Sunset
She can do things like this because she clips her recipes and keeps them, organized by meal type, in clear binders. I considered leaving her out of the roundup because I don’t want to face my own shame at the four-foot-high disheveled pile of magazine next to my refrigerator, but I chose to be a bigger person.
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Molly Wizenberg (aka Orangette, like I needed to tell you that) published this recipe for leek confit in a recent Bon Appetit
And now Rah Cha Chow does too, thank goodness, now that she’s made the confit and served it on crusty baguettes with goat cheese! Because I’ll say it again: leeks are fucking good, and I’m totally having a cocktail party just so I can make these.
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Our final entry is a total cheater because it doesn’t come from a cookbook or magazine or even a blog, but it’s from a non-blogger and I love it when they participate, so here you go. Thanks for playing, Emily, and thanks for this recipe, Emily’s ex-boyfriend’s mother!
“Ok, so I totally SUCK at hors d’oeuvres. Normally when I have people over for a dinner party I just want to sit them right down and start with soup or salad. But there is one no-fail hors d’oeuvres recipe I have. The recipe came from an ex-boyfriend’s mother, and is absurdly simple:
Boursin Stuffed Mushrooms:
Heat oven to 375 or 400. Spray a baking tray lightly with oil.Take about a pound of button mushrooms. Take the stems out, leaving the caps. Fill the mushroom caps with boursin cheese. Put the mushrooms on the tray, then spray the mushrooms lightly with oil. Bake for somewhere between 15-20 minutes, until the cheese is browned on top and the mushrooms have softened. Then try to actually leave some for guests, rather than scarfing them all oneself…”
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Random number generator Brian’s mom has selected Eatingclub Vancouver as this month’s giveaway winner. Send your smail mail address to michelle @ thursdaynightsmackdown dot com, and it’ll be on it’s way!
Next month the first Thursday falls on New Year’s Day, so I’m postponing the First Thursday to the 8th. The theme: Challenge Yourself!
Thursday Night Smackdown 
Hey, mock the Friends Cookbook all you like – the lasagna recipe in there is an absolute winner (mini-meatballs!), and the spiced pecans? People CANNOT walk away from them. My copy is proudly on my bookshelf, happily sitting with Ina, Nigella, and Alton. 😀
Oh, let’s all confess our cookbook skeletons. Mine is In the Kitchen with Rosie – the cookbook that everyone bought in the mid-90’s from one of Oprah’s chefs. You know, the one with the cajun spiced baked fries that we all couldn’t wait to make and they SUCKED!
And I would totally pick up the Friends cookbook if I saw one on the table of a library book sale or somewhere else I could get it for really cheap. I’m always looking for a better lasagna recipe.
Well, the onion tart recipe can’t be that bad. The fictional Monica was a chef after all.
My cookbook collection is too big for me mostly because i never use it anymore. I get all of my recipes from blogs!
We could’ve not admitted to the cheating, you know. 😉
And yehey! Woohoo! Wheeee! We won the prize!!! Teehee.
Hehe, thanks for not leaving me out. In all honesty, I usually have about 4 months of magazines in a dog-eared pile, then a few months of clippings just sort of stacked up waiting to be “filed”, then I shove them in a clear sheet thing wherever there is room, it’s not like the clippings are alphabetized or sorted by ingredient. Not totally anal retentive, just slightly, thank you very much. ;p
You know, the one with the cajun spiced baked fries that we all couldn’t wait to make and they SUCKED!
I totally copied that out of my mother’s copy, so I’d have it for myself. And yes, they did suck.
can’t believe i forgot! i posted my hors d’oeurvre and everything!!! what an idiot.
The funniest damn blog event round-up that I’ve read! Hope you try the leek confit — it’s good shit. BTW, I love to swear too, but I have kids and they read my blog. Thanks for the opportunity to swear on yours! 🙂
P.S. I propose a smackdown using cookbooks we’re ashamed of owning. Mine would have to come from the Desperate Housewives cookbook … although at least I won the cookbook and didn’t buy it!
What a fabulous idea! A smackdown using recipes from cookbooks we are ashamed we own! Even a discussion of cookbooks we are ashamed we own would be fun.
Dangit. I missed it again. 😦
trillian, you know, i tried to find it on amazon but was totally unable to (well, more like i gave up after the first 9 pages of results). but i am totally on board with anything involving mini-meatballs.
tracy and bev, i totally agree! i’m saving this theme up for ’09.
*Michelle* – I found it (I was bored). It’s out of print, but there are a bunch of used ones out there for $.01 + $3.99 shipping.
http://www.amazon.com/Cooking-Friends-Amy-Lyles-Wilson/dp/1558534571/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1229110759&sr=8-1
🙂