Happy Hour Dinner, Again?

Tuesday:
JR: That was a great idea to have happy hour food for dinner. We should do it again.
Me: Okay


Thursday:
JR: What are you planning for happy hour dinner this week?
Me: I don't know. I was thinking of not doing it on Sunday. I've got that big thing at work coming up on Monday and I'm not sure I'll have time.
JR: What! But it's a tradition.
Me: When did it become a tradition. We had it once.


Sunday morning:
JR: Have you got everything done for work?
Me: As done as I'll ever be.
JR: Great, that means you have time to make happy hour dinner.
Me: *sigh* Sure, I'll whip something up.









From top left clockwise:
Olive pasties, Avocado and Cream Cheese Roll, Spinach and Cheddar Dumplings.


With the holidays coming up I thought I'd start featuring recipes that can easily be made ahead and taken to all those potlucky type things that come up.



First up:

Avocado and Cream Cheese Roll

1/2 pound (8 ounces) of cream cheese, room temperature
2 small or 1 large avocado
1/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes, diced (or sun-dried tomato pesto or tapenade, store-bought or homemade)
1 cup Cashews
Small crackers

1. Place the cream cheese between 2 pieces of parchment or waxed paper. Roll out to form a rectangle about 6 inches wide and 8 inches long. Remove the top sheet.

2. Sprinkle diced sun-dried tomatoes over cream cheese or spread pesto or tapenade. I happened to have tapenade in my refridgerator so that is what I used.

3. Remove the flesh from the avocado and smash until smooth. You can leave small chunks. Spread over sun-dried tomatoes and cheese.

4. Using the bottom sheet of parchment roll up the cream cheese to form a log. I found this to be the messy part of the procedure. You may have better luck at this then I did. Do what you can to make it log shaped.

5. Put cashews into a blender or food processor and grind up. You want fairly small pieces but not dust. Coat cream cheese log with cashews.

6. Roll up in parchment and park in your refrigerator for at least 15 minutes. You can make this 6 to 8 hours ahead of time then set out for 30 minutes before serving.

7. Serve with small crackers.

I hope you all enjoy it as much as we did. Besides the whole rolling it into a log shape it was really easy to make. I plan to take it to our holiday party at the library. I think it will travel well.

If you want the recipes for the other items please let me know. I'll write them out.

Remember it's Meatless Monday today and if Monday doesn't work for you any day is good.


Love,
M



PS: This is my four hundredth postaversary. I thought it completely fitting that it was a food related one.