by Lisa

The salad on a stick was such a hit with everyone, and so easy and portable, I’ve been brainstorming variations.   And what better place to test the concept and recipes than a Memorial Day get together with Caroline and her family, and our friend Nicki Richesin & her family. Nicki has just edited the terrific anthology Crush: 26 Real Life Tales of First Love, which you should put on the top of your summer reading list.

I made bite size versions of the salad-on-a-stick with toothpicks instead of skewers, and it turned out to be perfect party food.  They were a big hit with the grown-ups, and some of the kids. But the kids were mostly busy with the zip line, which Tony re-created for the afternoon and kept all of them busy for, oh, 4 hours. So can you blame them for not eating very much while there were things to build and fly and crash?

We set the platters out on the deck for snackingwhile building, but we adults ate most of them. For two of the choices, I put a small slice of bread on the bottom to soak up the dipping sauce. It worked beautifully.

The choices:

Roasted Pepper + Manchego + Brown bread

Cherry tomato + basil leaf + mini-baguette slice, with olive oil + balsamic vinegar for dipping

Romaine leaf + bacon + feta dressing & ranch dressing, for dipping