Ready to Please Appetizers

By: Tracy Carpenter

With the arrival of the holidays, many of us experience an odd mixture of excitement and dread as we prepare to celebrate the season. We get excited about the Christmas lights, the family meals together, and opening gifts, but we also fear the stress of a tight budget, rushing around at the last minute for the perfect gift, to working with scheduling conflicts. This year, we can add COVID-19 to the list of stressors.

Social distancing, coronavirus and COVID-19 will probably be what we remember most about 2020. The pandemic may even change some holiday traditions for many of us, but that doesn't mean we have to cancel the holidays. Shutdowns, quarantines and social distancing has most of us longing, now more than ever, to gather our family and friends to celebrate with food, games, reminiscing, and shopping trips.

This year, whether you choose to stay home with your family, invite friends over or visit friends and family, do you have a clue what you're going to make? If your answer is no, then I feel you and I've been there, done that! There's nothing worse than not knowing what you want to make for all your family and friends to snack on during the holidays. Would you agree that there's so much more to the festive season than just one big lunch and dinner? What do we do in between? Friends and family dropping in and out, office parties, and church potlucks. Like many folks, I'm always searching for holiday recipes that will tantalize taste buds and ass a festive tough to holiday celebrations. Whether you're hosting or asked to bring something to eat, we all know appetizers are where it's at.

We all have recipe collections aplenty for the food centered celebrations on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Eve. Which recipes will you be making for your next big party? Which ones will you be surprising your friends and family with on a quiet evening at home during the holiday season? I hope this roundup of appetizer recipes will inspire you. Maybe you've already tried some of these. Maybe not. Maybe you can create a new way of preparing them to wow your guests. I'm sure your family and friends will love what you choose to make.