Naptime Entertaining: Recipes & Ideas for Family Entertaining

When it comes to entertaining this season a lot of you asked for some easy-peasy quick party recipes. I am, of course, very happy to oblige since you know I am all about delicious food made with minimal fuss. Today I’ve partnered with Whole Foods Market to share an excellent, and simple, seafood appetizer that is perfect for seasonal entertaining. Sure, this could be done with seafood from any market, but today I am specifically working with Whole Foods Market because of their commitment to sustainability.

Tonight is Mom’s Night Out! Woot! Of course, this year this doesn’t carry the same meaning it usually does. But I’ll take whatever mid-week break I can get during the holiday season. Celebrating with friends is always up my alley, even if it means sipping my Elderflower Presse and being the designated driver. For my contribution to the little potluck we’ll be having at Maura’s house I am bringing a trio of party crostinis. I LOVE taking crostinis to parties because they are so easy to prepare ahead of time, they travel well, and everyone always appreciates a party nibble that can be eaten in two bites or less.

Since we are on the topic of homemade gifts I want to share another one of my favorite small batch homemade gift recipes: White Chocolate Bark with Fruit & Granola. This sweet, crunchy bark first came about when I was attempting Ina Garten’s recipe for White Chocolate Bark and realized I was out of walnuts. Instead, I tossed on some homemade Dried Cherry Granola followed by a handful of toasted sliced almonds and a new holiday recipe was born!

I’ve been posting some of my Thanksgiving favorites over the past week because we’ve been enjoying them all month long. That is really one of the hidden beauties of skipping the mega family feast every few years – you can just enjoy what you want when you want! To leave you with a truly wonderful dish, today I am sharing one of my favorite Thanksgiving desserts. Obviously, I love pumpkin pie but sometimes I need a break. I mean, how doesn’t love it when the pumpkin flavor comes from the ice cream (!) and there is a graham cracker crust involved.

Well, Sandy has come and gone and I am getting back into the swing of things with cooking and posting. As most of you on Facebook know, our property managed to stay safe during the hurricane despite our close proximity to the beach. But we lost power for nearly a week. While I wanted to stay put and help my less fortunate neighbors it simply didn’t make sense for me to stick around in frigid temps with a young child while pregnant. So, we fled to Cooperstown for a week of electricity and grandparent TLC and just returned to Connecticut earlier this week. While we were in Cooperstown we did our best to lift our spirits with some fun activities. We helped my daughter master her new Razor scooter, made several trips to the Fly Creek Cider Mill, and celebrated my Dad’s birthday with this awesome Moist Carrot Cake.

Last week my friend Valessa asked me if I had a recipe for Pumpkin Cranberry Bread. I quickly realized, to my horror, that I have this classic Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread on my website but haven’t posted any major pumpkin bread recipe since (!) I am a little amazed by this since I adore making a quick loaf of pumpkin bread here and there with my daughter and clearly have not thought to mention my recipe for this simply awesome snack in this space. Oops!

Brunch is a great time of day to entertain when you have kids. Mid-morning most kids are, generally speaking, in a good mood, parents are pleased to get out of the house so early, and the food is always fun. Since my daughter is really into pancakes these days I recently decided to entertain friends with a big Chai-spiced Dutch baby pancake. It is infinitely easier to make than standing over the stovetop flipping the silver dollar kind. Plus, it can be sliced and served like a pie, keeping the brunch buffet neat and tidy.

Around the holidays I love to get extra-crafty with my gift-giving and celebration style. Most of the time when I give a batch of cookies or brownies to a friend I employ a simple, pretty packaging technique that always looks good but doesn’t take a ton of effort. But, when the holidays roll around, I like to break out the big(ger) guns and see what fun stuff I can come up with. This month I’m all about pumpkin recipes and Halloween and packaging up cute treats to take to friends like these awesome pumpkin swirl brownies!

Last weekend I celebrated my birthday. As most of you know, I am not one to shy away from birthdays. For most of my life I spent nearly the entire year longing for my birthday to come around. As the youngest person of my peer group in school/college/life I was always excited to get a little older, to attain the age and status of those around me. These days I don’t really care so much about getting old, I just view my birthday to spend a fun night out with my husband and take advantage of the excuse to make myself an awesome homemade cake.

While in Cooperstown I’ve been catching up on my cookbook reading (they are stacked on my nightstand like novels) and trying out new recipes while entertaining friends. One book that has really caught my eye recently is Cowgirl Chef, Ellise Pierce’s new book about Texas cooking with a French accent. It is based on her popular blog of the same name. As you might guess, Ellise is a native Texan current living Paris and combines cooking styles from her youth with those of her current home in the City of Lights.

Last week I had less than half an hour to whip up a simple summer treat for a last minute dinner party. With some fresh tomatoes, my ever-present stash of Parmesan, and a tuft of fresh basil in the herb pot I decided to make my favorite Tomato Tart with Parmesan and Basil. Coincidentally, my dear friend Liz the Chef had just emailed me from San Diego to say she was enjoying her latest version of this tart. We both became addicted to it last summer when I first wrote about it on Babble. It seems with tomato season in full swing we both had this light summer dish on the brain!

Last weekend we decided to have a breakfast party. Since my daughter and I will be on the Vineyard for book events this week we wanted to have one last nice breakfast together before not seeing Dad for a whole seven days. Morning entertaining, even for just your family, can be kind of tricky. How early do you get up to cook (especially if you value sleeping in like me)? How fancy do you get? My answer was not to get up too early or get too fancy, instead focusing on a fresh, fun breakfast of lemon cream cheese pancakes with blueberry maple syrup.