Appetizers & Snacks

I make meat chips from cured meats like salami, prosciutto, pancetta, etc., to nibble on or dip in fondue or queso. You can crumble tem on otherwise healthy dishes like salads and granola… just kidding.  Perfect for gluten-free and paleo diets as well as for meat freaks.

For your gluten-free holiday entertaining try Fall Fowl Balls. They’re little turkey meatballs studded with apples, cheddar cheese and rolled in nuts for a light and tasty autumn appetizer! Turkey meat tends to be dry. I add sautéed veggies, grated cheddar and diced dried apples to the turkey meat to give it a nice texture and fall herbs to give a cozy bite.

My Jewish ancestors on my mom’s side CHEER when I make chopped liver. It’s funny, my Jamaican, paternal grandfather worked in a Jewish hotel, so he was partial to chopped liver as well. For my paternal grandmother, no trip to Zabar’s was complete without picking up some chopped liver with the good rye bread, the one with the seeds.

Remember when you simply threw the canned chickpeas in the food processor to make hummus. Those were the good, easy days. Now you must slip the skins off each chickpea or die of hummus shame because it’s not smooth enough. This is my work around and you can totally grab a can of chickpeas and slip off the skins, one at a time…

Miang Kana means “many bites”. It’s a street food from Thailand where you combine ingredients in a leaf and eat them together for a flavor explosion. It’s a fun dish for a summer party or BBQ!

Inspired by cevapcici, a skinless, grilled sausage that originated in the Balkan states. I first had them in Australia and have never seen them in New York. Perhaps I will start a trend?

St. Patrick’s Day inspired Shepherd’s Pie Stuffed Mushrooms: mushroom caps stuffed with a hearty shepherd’s pie filling, topped with mashed potatoes and Irish cheddar cheese. St. Paddy’s Day is not really one of my celebrated holidays. I’m not one to run out and make a bunch of green-colored food or drink green beer (shuddering), but this dish is a great gluten free dish or appetizer any day..

Talk about flexible! This mushroom, zucchini and fennel dish can be served as a salsa, bruschetta or cecina topping, quesadilla filling or a side dish.

A recipe for a simple savory crêpe made from chickpea flour, water, olive oil, salt and pepper. You can serve it with any kind of dip, tartare, salsa, curry, salad, etc or just nibble it on it’s own.

Sautéed hot and roasted peppers add zing to this warm calamari salad topped with fried capers.

Three Ingredients give you sweet, heat and acid in this glaze for my Cooked The Sh*t Wings or a whole chicken or a pork loin, corn on the cob, etc.

A spicy Sichuan peppercorn flavored cucumber salad where you smash the cucumber so it absorbs more of the dressing.

The words healthy and fried do not always go together, but delicious and fried usually do. These healthier-than-meat 10 Veggie Egg Rolls nail fried and delicious! Use any combo of veggies you like that combine to make six cups of filling.

Egg rolls used to be the staple appetizer in the New York Chinese restaurants of my youth. Now they are like hen’s teeth so I had to make them myself.

There is something so satisfying about making your own gravlax. It’s easy, but looks like you sweated over it. I added fresh beets to the curing mixture to give even more dazzle!

These lemongrass spiced beef rolls were a favorite hors d’oeuvre we served when I was freelance catering cook in Melbourne, Australia. The kitchen was near Little Saigon, so we would buy these in rather than make them.

This is a lovely salad that I originally had in Montreal, at the Dominion Square Tavern, in the dead of winter in 2012. It’s a long way from New York so I had to make my own version.

I make them my way. I like them crispy and golden and salty and slathered with sour cream and something sweet.

A dramatic, yet simple flaxseed and sesame cracker that goes great with dips or crumbled on a salad for extra crunch. Psst… it’s good for your health!

I live around the corner from Paisano’s Meat Market on Smith Street in Brooklyn. They sell Italian sausage meat which is a fatty, spiced ground pork mixture studded with fennel seeds. You could pretty much mix anything into it and it would be AMAZING. When I was researching my International Men With Balls Brunch I came across this popular dish that’s often made with Bisquick. Mine have a much higher ratio of I made gluten free sausage and cheddar balls.

How do you say crowd pleaser? Your guests will hoover this dip. It reminds me a little of Boursin, but with a whole lot more roasted garlicky goodness.

I added some spunk to a classic appetizer that no one would have considered whether or not was gluten free back in the 60’s, but it is. I leave a few of them crackling free so the vegetarians can enjoy an old favorite.

This is a delicious spin on potato pancakes is perfect for Passover! I wanted it to be extra crunchy, so I added crisped rice to the coating. I was curious to see how this would work out and it did so “CRUNCH-i-liciously”!

There are no proportions for the ingredients in this recipe, only the technique. I figure on six to ten wings per person. I always make extra since we can usually eat a ton of these and even if we can’t finish them, we are very happy to eat them the next day. Make a sticky sauce and consider giving them a wee sprinkle of a little something crunchy when they come out of the oven like garlic chips, sesame seeds, bacon bits, and so forth (more ideas below).

This is the most fun, interactive, edible holiday appetizer centerpiece I’ve ever made. Not only will it engage the whole family, but your guest’s faces with light up and twinkle like Christmas tree lights when they see it.

The smokiness almost makes these “shrooms” taste like they were barbecued. They make a great potluck dish because they can be served warm or room temperature.

Radishes can be hot and I’m not talking “trendy”. Common pinky-red European radishes are often spicy, almost peppery when raw. Anchovies and garlic are not shy of flavor either. Roasting them together tames them into a dish where they seem to give up their feisty notes and make nice together in the sand box of your mouth. Did I really just write that? Forgive me. They just remind me of bratty, little, only-children who are impossible until they meet each other in the playground and have to be nice… at least to one another.

I totally agree, raw chicken sushi would definitely be GROSS! And that’s not what I made, but I do like calling this recipe for baked nori wrapped chicken breast rolls stuffed with veggies “Chicken Sushi” because people get a very curious look on their faces when I say it. It’s definitely something unexpected. Use gluten free soy to make it and you have a gluten free and low carb appetizer. Poke a skewer in it to serve them and they become Chicken Sushi Pops and they are even more curious and delightful.

I like lots of crunch and I cannot LIE! There’s something completely adorable about tiny croutons—they’re like kittens.

This dish looks great on a plate, especially if you can get the red and white endive for contrast.

Every time I order sushi, I swear I’m getting something different and then I order a salmon skin roll. Perhaps that’s because salmon skin rarely shows up anywhere else in my life and I have to get my fix. Props to the Japanese for inspiring this cross cultural dish.

I went to Purple Yam, a Filipino restaurant in Brooklyn, owned by Amy Besa and Romy Dorotan, for a fundraiser to help victims of Typhoon Haiyan. Romy served “tacos” where the taco shells were made from nori, the seaweed you usually find around sushi. He was kind enough to describe how he made them, and now you can make them.

Once every couple of months a bunch of food lovers gather for Brooklyn Swappers where they trade homemade goods. You never know what these wonderfully creative cooks will be swapping: pickles, jams, sauces, chutneys, relishes, infused alcohols, teas, cakes, cookies, flavored salts, chocolates, candies, kombucha—it could be ANYTHING! For Sunday’s brunch swap, I made Salted Cinnamon Browned Butter Caramels. There’s also a potluck, for which I believe I invented a new dish: The Deviled Egg Egg