Canape Recipes for Your Dinner Party

Custom Search

Canape recipes usually consist of sliced bread, or toast, or crackers, covered with finely chopped meat, pates, relishes etc., all appropriately garnished. Canape is a French term literally meaning "bed" or "couch". In the culinary sense it is used as a bed on which to rest savory foods.

Canapes Dinner Party Canapes

Although traditional canape recipes are for open faced sandwiches and appetizers, the term canape can also be used to refer to a closed type of sandwich that is smaller and bite-sized.

When looking for canape recipes, don't limit your bases to breads and crackers. Anything study that will hold up to a bit of moisture from whatever topping you are using will do. Try a tortilla chip, a firm and crisp thickly sliced cucumber, or a crisp vegetable chip.

With the variety of breads and crackers available at the average supermarket, there is no lack of bases for your canape recipes. Fillings, spreads, bases and topping can be mixed and matched and interchanged for an endless variety of canapes for your next gathering. Canape recipes are a must for tea parties, where dainty foods are passed around on elegant trays. Here are a few canape ideas to give you some inspiration.

Canape Recipes

PREPARED BREAD FOR ALL CANAPES

Canapes are made from stale white bread, cut in quarter-inch slices and then shaped with a cutter into circles two and one-half or three inches in diameter or cut into squares, strips, triangles or other fancy shapes. These portions of bread may then be fried in deep fat and drained on absorbent paper, or sauteed in just enough fat to keep them from burning, or toasted or set in the oven until they turn a delicate brown. When finished they should be nicely browned on both sides. They are then ready to be covered with the mixture preferred.

ANCHOVY CANAPES

6 portions prepared bread 3 teaspoons lemon-juice
3 tablespoons anchovy paste 2 hard-cooked eggs
Whole anchovies for garnish (may be omitted)

Anchovy paste, which comes in tubes, jars or bottles, may be utilized, or whole anchovies may be reduced to a smooth paste with a wooden spoon.

Season with lemon-juice and spread the paste on the prepared pieces of bread. Split anchovy lengthwise and lay the halves diagonally across the canape, marking the point where they cross by a little pyramid of riced yolk of hard-cooked eggs. Petal-shaped pieces of the hard-cooked white may radiate from this center pyramid.

A large anchovy curved around a circle of hard-cooked egg in the center of a canape is also effective. The anchovies may be omitted from the garnish.

SARDINE OR LOBSTER OR OTHER SEAFOOD CANAPES

6 portions prepared bread
6 large sardines or 6 tablespoons lobster or other seafood, chopped fine
Juice of 1 lemon
Salt
Worcestershire sauce
Pickled beets
6 large olives
24 thin slices lemon

Remove skin and backbone and flake the sardines with a fork. Or chop cooked lobster meat very fine. Season with lemon-juice, salt and a few drops of Worcestershire sauce.

Spread the prepared bread with the mixture and decorate by placing in the center of each canape a small circle of pickled beet. Cut a slice from the end of a large olive so that it will stand firmly and place this in the center of the beet. A narrow border of minced beet may be placed around the edge of the canape with good effect. Garnish the plate with four thin slices of lemon placed symmetrically.

Crab meat, shrimps or any smoked or canned fish, highly seasoned and attractively garnished, may be utilized for this canape recipe instead of the sardines or lobster meat.

CAVIAR CANAPES

6 portions prepared bread 3 tablespoons white onion, chopped fine
3 tablespoons caviar
Garnish of green pepper or hard-cooked egg

Caviar, which is the salted roe of the sturgeon, is highly esteemed by epicures as an appetizer. It is usually served with minced raw onion and decorated with hard-cooked egg and minced pickles.

A favorite arrangement is to have an oblong canapé two by four inches, one half covered with the minced raw onion and the other half with the caviar. The striking difference in the colors is very effective.

A sliver of green pep¬per may lie just where the two mixtures meet and little points of the green pepper extend out on each side, or a circle of the white of hard-cooked egg may decorate the center of the half covered with caviar and a little mound of the riced yolk ornament the section covered by the chopped onion.

CHEESE AND OLIVE CANAPES

6 portions prepared bread Garnish of red pepper or
3 tablespoons cream cheese pickled beet
Olives stuffed with pimientos

Spread on the prepared bread a paste made by mixing equal proportions of cream cheese and chopped stuffed olives. Garnish with a quarter-inch border of the chopped olives and a star of red pepper or pickled beet in the center of each canape.

PATE DE FOIE GRAS CANAPES

6 portions prepared bread    1/4 cup cream
3 tablespoons pate de foie gras paste    Cayenne pepper
or imitation pate de foie gras    Salt
Parsley

Add the cream and seasoning to the paste. Rub through a fine sieve and spread on portions of fried bread. Garnish with parsley.

IMITATION PATE DE FOIE GRAS

1/4 cup chicken livers 1/4 onion; chopped
2 tablespoons chicken fat or butter Salt and pepper
Mustard or celery salt

Carefully clean, cook and chop chicken livers and mash them to a paste with a wooden spoon. Chop the onion fine and fry in the fat till yellowed. Place the livers, the fat and the onion in a cup, mix well and season with pepper and salt, and either mustard or celery salt, according to taste. Refrigerate until well chilled. Use in the above recipe.