So every year, my parents and three other couples have this huge dinner party that they call “The Progressive Dinner.”  There are four courses: Appetizers, Soup & Salad, Entree and Dessert and each couple is responsible for a course of the meal.  They move from house to house all night, eating and drinking and celebrating during the best season of the year – Christmas.  This year, the date is set for Saturday, December 11th and my parents have the appetizer course.  The kicker? They want my help.

My mom came to me the other day and told me that her and my dad talked about it and they want my input about what they should serve.  They are hoping to put out four delicious appetizers to satisfy everyone’s tastes, which means only including one that contains seafood since it’s not as popular amongst their friends.  Immediately, I went to work trying to find a collection of perfect appetizers that my parents could blow the other couples away with.

I have selected eight appetizers for them to choose from:

1. Savory brie en croute with walnuts

2. Mini quiches with ham and spinach

3. Classic spinach-artichoke dip

4. Crab-stuffed mushrooms

5.  Herb-crusted mozzarella bites

6. Classic tomato-basil bruschetta

7. Mushroom tartlets

8. Mini stuff sweet peppers

I plan on making a small batch of each app at a date TBD and having my parents sample them and pick their top four.  I think it’ll be a fun project for myself, especially if the recipes need to be tweaked or modified after the original parental tasting.  I will update the progress and how the tasting goes as soon as I figure out when it will be.