Not to leave you hanging, here is the summary of this year’s White Elephant party. First off: it was a complete success. We ended up with 29 guests and the perfect amount of food for everyone (in year’s past we’d make WAY too much and end up eating leftovers for over a week). This year we had only a small number of things remaining at the party’s end and folks left with full bellies and craptastic White Elephant gifts (and a couple treats).
First, the menu. I highlighted some of the food we made in another post, and what’s funny is that at the party at least one person said, “I was surprised you only made 8 things this year,” to which I responded, “I actually opted NOT to spoil the entire menu online ahead of time – we have more than 8.” She was very happy to hear that news. *lol*
1. Meatballs (Swedish + Cranberry) (Beef/GF) – Both varieties were delicious. I was able to sample each and I’d be perfectly content making both of them again. The crockpots were EMPTY at the end of the night, so I’d say our guests like them as well.
2. Crab Rangoon Cups (Seafood) – Delicious and one of my personal favorites. Also CootieGirl’s favorite (she devoured 3-4 at the party). Such an easy hors d’oeuvre to make and definitely a keeper to repeat at some point.
3. Stuffed Mushrooms (Veg/GF/Keto) – Denis makes these very year and is thinking of retiring them after this year in favor of a 100% brand new menu. I think it would be weird NOT to serve them, since they are always gobbled up by the guests.
4. Bruschetta (Veg) – You can’t have a party without bruschetta on hand. Once again we did two varieties – one with pesto, and one with goat cheese. Denis also mentioned retiring bruschetta after this year, but I talked him into keeping it – it’s easy to make, people enjoy it, and there are so many options to make them different each year!
5. Shrimp and Chorizo (Seafood/GF/Keto) – Once again, for the second year in a row, these were a huge hit at the party. Lots of people asking exactly how to make them (the only unknown is the marinade on the shrimp, but really ANY marinade can be used so it’s literally cooking up slices of chorizo, using a toothpick to spear it with a raw shrimp that has been marinating for a few hours, and then baking for 10-15 minutes in the oven until the shrimp is pink. It’s gluten-free, keto-friendly, and EASY.
6. Chicken Lettuce Wraps (Chicken/GF/Keto) – This was a repeat from a few years ago and BOY HOWDY was it delicious this time around. This is the one for which I got the most recipe requests. I used a pineapple flavored BBQ sauce and that sweetness made this hors d’oeuvre absolutely delightful. Serving it on endive was perfect as well – much better than using romaine hearts. As I said in my post just prior to the party, I’m going to just make the filling for my lunch at work. SO SO good.
7. Spicy Thai Beef Cucumber Bites (Beef/GF/Keto) – This was another popular item because the beef had just enough kick from the gochujang sauce to offset the fact it was served cold on cucumber slices. We will definitely repeat this one at some point.
8. Spicy/Sweet Bacon-Wrapped Chicken – Another new one that was a huge hit. It cooked up perfectly and people were very pleased by them. I made a full tray of them (about 36) and I believe they were gone in minutes despite being served later in the food service timeframe.
9. BBQ Pulled Pork on Sweet Potato – this was a last minute addition to replace a crab hors d’oeuvre that needed to be taken out since we were also making the crab rangoons. This one was absolutely delicious and easy to make. The bonus for us? Denis smoking a pork butt a few days in advance that our family enjoyed tremendously, and then having this hors d’oeuvre a few days later as well!
10. Zucchini Garlic Bites – This was the only “miss” of the night, but for two reasons. One, it was the last thing to be served and people were already stuffed to the gills at that point. Secondly, zucchini is SUCH a wet vegetable that no matter how much you reduce the amount of water in it, there’s still water in it. The result was that the garlic bites never truly solidified while being baked, and were really gooey when they came out of the oven. Tasty, yes, but very difficult to eat. In talking with someone about it a couple days later, they recommend that we shred the zucchini, sprinkle with salt and then bake the salted shreds in the oven for a few minutes to crisp them up. THEN make them into the balls and bake again before serving. Denis said he’d try to make these again and see if that fixes the issue. If it does, then we’ll make it again next year but serve it earlier in the night so people can actually enjoy them.
11. Walnut & Bacon Brie Bread Bowl – This was the other miss, although flavor-wise we definitely got compliments on it. The problem was that the brie just didn’t melt inside the bread bowl, despite baking it much longer than the recipe called for. As such, when I finally served it, it was still very much a mostly-solid piece of brie instead of the creamy, drippy brie that you would normally get after it has been baking in the oven for a long time.
And that was our menu for 2018.
As for the party, we had lots of newcomers this year – a few people from my job, one couple from Denis’s. It was fun having new people there who have not experienced our party before. The game itself was a blast although with 30 players it lasted a VERY long time. We also had some high quality gifts, to which one long-time attendee said something to the effect of, “You new people need to LOWER your standards for next year.” We had some return gifts – notably the disco ball from 2016 – and while we were all waiting for the 1970s Super Arm Blaster to make a reappearance, it was sadly missing from the fray this year.
Since this was our 20th annual party, we decided to do a couple special things to celebrate. The first thing related to the WE game itself. The way we play, whoever is #1 gets to steal ANY gift at the end of the game, including those things that have been stolen three times already. Basically, whoever gets their item stolen by #1 at the end of the game is the biggest loser of the night. This year, we had a custom t-shirt made to reward the biggest loser.
The t-shirt was a big hit when we gave it to the “winner” and we may opt to have a new one made every year to reward the biggest loser.
Additionally, instead of making a dozen varieties of cookies to box up and give out at the end of the night, we opted to go a bit more special, and ordered a custom 5 oz stemless wine glass, into which we put an organza bag of special holiday stamped M&Ms. This is what the glass looked like (with our last name replaced with “Cooties'” since I’m posting on the interwebs, obviously):
They came out great and we only ended up with 6 left at the end of the night – I plan on giving those to a couple people who normally come to our party but were not able to make it this year.
All in all, it was a fun, fun night. One of my co-workers brought her sister as her guest, and apparently the sister was very impressed and my co-worker claimed, “My sister wants to be you when she grows up.” I do remember the sister asking me how I was remaining so calm during the party, given all the moving parts of cooking and serving food but also needing to socialize. I said, “This is our 20th year – if we didn’t have it figured out by now, we shouldn’t be throwing this party!”
But we HAVE figured it out, and we’re already looking ahead to 2019!
