Need Vegetarian Buffet/Party Food

meritaten

jeez £1 per head! can be done - lets see, big bowl of green salad (mostly leaves with chopped cucumber and some spring onions). make some pastry and make savoury twists, either spread them with marmite, vegemite or grated parmesan or cheddar and bake. some finger sandwiches - egg and cress?, a bean salad with three beans(tinned, use butter beans , pinto, and broad or Harico beans) tossed in mayo with paprika and a little crushed garlic.for dessert do a cheese platter - three different cheeses - one soft one cheddar and one blue cheese with a packet of either ritz or any nice cracker and a small bunch of grapes.

mmmsnow

I was at a house warming recently and the hostess made a couple of wonderful salads (I think they were both Jamie Oliver). One was cous cous based while the other was tomato, balsamic vinegar, olive oil and basil. Here's the cous cous recipe: http://www.thekindlife.com/forum/thread/amazing-couscous-salad-by-jamie-oliver.

jackieglasgow

Morrisons have bags of baby new potatoes at 49p just now, Tescos are 67p, cut them in half, coat in olive oil, paprika, garlic powder and salt and pepper and roast for about 35 mins, or in fajita or taco seasoning and oil, checp filling and delicious, we are having a variation on these three or four times a week just now for dinner.

annie-c

If you go with the chilli idea then Tesco value tortilla chips are 25p a bag and are great value. Also if you type 'Ramadan' into the Tesco grocery search box, then all the Ramadan offers will come up. There are good quality plum tomatoes on there at approx 30p at the moment. And rice is on offer too I think. Creme fraiche is 2 for £1.60 at Tesco too - a very lovely thing to dollop on hot chilli. Add a squeeze of lime juice and you will have respectable posh nosh, v cheaply....

If you can get to a local market you should be able to get all the veg you will need v cheaply, or try the supermarkets after 7pm for mark downs. Most veg for chilli can be chopped and frozen in advance.

lauracusack

coastdk wrote: »

Yep and tinned beans are nice and cheap too. You can use a variety of different types. Add some onions, peppers and courgettes and you have a very tasty meal.

And with something like a chilli, if there are any leftovers you can freeze them. You can't do that with buffet sandwiches!

True. And I have some courgettes in the garden yay!

lauracusack

katkins78 wrote: »

Easily do-able with £15 and if you have a slow cooker I would be inclined to equip it with a ladle and leave it on the table for folks to help themselves - the chilli would stay lovely and warm.

I recently got given one but it's only really big enough for 4 portions :think: I didn't even think about how I'd keep it warm...

lauracusack

katkins78 wrote: »

Mezze is like tapas only lots of small greek dishes:D
Houmous, baba ganoush
Dolmas-stuffed vine leaves
Halloumi, tomato bread
erm, olives, feta, pitta, griddledveg with skordalia

I have to say Lidls do some quite nice qreek mezze type things and I think their houmous is very good too. I once did a greek themed dinner and bought their bog standard large tub of houmous, I diligently decanted into separate bowls and added a sprinkle of cayenne to one, chopped sundried tomates to another (also good and cheap from lidls- I promise I am not affiliated:o) and some caramelised onions to the third bowl, andjust a fresh spritz of lemon in the foruth. A little swirl of olive oil on top, served with some toasted shards of pitta.....and pretended I had done it all from scratch:o. It was a work of 10 minutes or so and yet I got heaps of praise- people had to be prised away from it! My main which I spent hours labouring away on practically passed unnoticed and when I returned to the kitchen later in the evening I caught my mother scooping up the remants with a packet of crisps! Most unfair!

Sound like a plan! I LOVE houmous with pitta bread, toasted and cut up into little pieces! I think I may do a chili, as suggested by a few people her (will only cost 2/3 quid!) and then do some mezze bits to go with. If I make sure my chillies quite Spanish as opposed to American-y then it should sit quite well. A sort of medditerrainian theme.

Any ideas for a medditerrainian punch anyone?? :beer:

katkins78

Gosh, all i can think of is sangria. http://www.spanish-fiestas.com/recipes/sangria.htm

Plan sounds like a winner btw!

Kitchenbunny

Mr M have packs of 6 Value Pitta Breads for 19p. A recipe like this could be useful and tasty for either a Med or a Mex themed party. Seconding the Sangria idea too!

KB xx

lightisfading

If you go the mex route, to go with chilli...

A cheaper, healthier alternative to sour cream that we use all the time is plain yoghurt - either as it is or we drain it through muslin and a sieve for an hour or so to make it thicker.

Cheap pitta breads sliced up and grilled with a bit of oil and some seasoning - I actually prefer these to proper tortilla chips.

If you want salsa, be selective as a lot of the cheap ones are nasty - Aldi's is my favourite 'cheap' option whereas Lidl's is horrible IMHO!

Potato skins could work quite well - just bog standard ones, cook, slice into 'flat' halves, scoop out most of the innards. Drizzle/spray with oil and some mex seasoning and bake til getting crispy, then top with salsa/cheese/sour cream.

Oh, and one of my favourite 'toppers' for mexican stuff is grilled corn: defrost/nuke some frozen value sweetcorn kernels then grill or saute with just a tiny bit of oil til they just start to go brown. It's really tasty i promise! Chuck on top of your chilli or just have it as a side dish.