Oh, oh! You’ve been too busy and put off planning that graduation open house until the last minute? Or maybe you’ve been thinking about it for months and can’t decide what to serve? Even if you need some last minute fillers for your graduation open house buffet, it’s a good thing you clicked this article. Here are 25+ easy foods, snacks and recipes to make a nice graduation open house buffet. These can be used for wedding bridal shower recipes, first Communion receptions and other open house buffets also.
Chances are guests will attend other open houses, so there’s no need to make a full meal. Snacks are perfect for open houses. Appetizers, snacks and finger food are much neater than big sloppy pans of food.
Fresh Fruit Kebabs: Make ahead or let guests DIY. Set out a fruit tray with kebab spears, toothpicks or plastic restaurant cocktail swords. Use a variety of color: green grapes, yellow pineapple chunks, strawberries, blueberries, canned mandarin orange segments. Guest DIY fruit kebabs mean less waste of fruit and saves you work.
Savory Hors-d-oeuvres: Make a variety of colorful appetizers; here are several popular kinds.
Spread cream cheese on both sweet and dill pickles. Wrap each pickle in a slice of lunch meat (ham or turkey breast). Slice widthwise.
Place potato salad in a line along the middle of a slice of luncheon meat. Form meat into a roll. Secure with toothpick.
Using white, wheat and dark pumpernickel bread, make checkerboard sandwiches. Place filling on two slices of bread. Layer the three kinds of bread in a sandwich (no filling on top or bottom). Slice triple layer sandwich into 1/2 inch sandwich strips. Arrange on platter with alternating colors.
Sandwich filling:
-cream cheese and jelly
-egg salad and green pepper
-cream cheese, cucumber and tomato slices with pepper
-cream cheese and ham
-roast beef, swiss cheese and spicy brown mustard
Take one slice of deli cheese and one slice of deli meat. Roll them together around a green scallion and cover with cream cheese. Roll in crushed walnuts and parsley. Slice in rolls.
With long pretzel rods, spread cream cheese on half of the pretzel. Wrap some with meat and some with cheese. Place in a bowl and guests can grab and munch.
Take a tortilla shell and spread with cream cheese and spicy brown mustard. Place two large leaves of romaine lettuce. On the lettuce lay several slices of deli cheese or tomato. Roll tortilla into tight log. Seal opening with cream cheese. Place seam side down and slice into pinwheels.
Frosted sandwiches: Layer six slices of bread with alternating fillings. Spread garlic onion cream cheese over outside of sandwich stack. Slice vertically through layers and then cut each piece into finger sized pieces. Filing suggestions: egg salad and tuna salad. Ham sandwich spread and chicken salad. Deli ham and deli cheese.
Serve with iced sun tea lemonade and raspberries.
Just a bit of trivia: I found some of these recipes in my mother’s Betty Crocker Recipe Card Library, circa 1971.
