Crudités platter (kroo-de-tay) is a traditional French appetizer which consists of whole and sliced fresh raw vegetables. I love the rustic way the French display their vegetable platters. I'm a vintage glass person but if you are more contemporary, you can use more sleek glass ware with simple lines. Use very large platters... glass, wood, pottery just make sure it's big. I like cutting the veggies in unusual ways not your traditional bite size pieces. This celery will be put in a tall glass to feather out over the top of the glass. I also used red and yellow cherry tomatoes which would look beautiful in a green vintage depression glass bowl I have. Imagine a bowl of cherry tomatoes on a large platter, even a taller dish for the vegetable dip, several beautiful vintage glasses with celery, maybe baby carrots that are yellow, orange and purple sitting up right in a glass. Use different glasses that are different heights. Other vegetables arrange in small hills on the platter, like the zucchini and squash that I cut paper thin and then rolled up.
I catered a Christmas party over the holidays and above are some pictures I took of vegetables I was preparing for the party. I flashed boiled the asparagus and green beans for 45-60 seconds and then immediately put them in a large bowl of ice water for several minutes and then drained them on a paper towel. I lined a container with a wet paper towel and arranged the vegetables and then covered them with a wet paper towel and put a lid on the container which kept them fresh for the next day. My clients party was on the day of the ice storm and I had to deliver a day early but everything was fine. My client had a huge wooden rustic platter that she was going to arrange everything on.
I pictured the slicer I used and I got this at Williams Sonoma and it sliced the zucchini and yellow squash perfectly. Cut off the ends of the squash and zucchini and cut away any imperfections and wash and dry. Then you just run the slicer over the squash and it cuts it very smoothly. The other side of the slicer is like a grater and it will cut the zucchini or squash to look like spaghetti. I have started buying the mini cucumbers and they have a much better flavor and to me they are worth the extra price. The skins are very thin and there is no wax on them....they are wonderful. I cut these on the diagonal but they also look great cut into fourths length wise again standing up in a glass.
Other vegetables that would be wonderful on these platters are fingerling potatoes which you would boil until tender and cut in half, radishes cut into thirds long way, Jicama peel and cut these into strips and squeeze with lemon, sugar snap peas, kohlrabi peel and cut into rounds and this taste somewhat like broccoli. I'm sure you can think of something I haven't mentioned here.
I have this pictured all in my mind and I'm sorry I don't have a picture to show you but I plan on making this for my family some time and I will post a picture when I do. I hope you can see what I'm trying to say as I see it in my mind. :)
For your next party a crudités platter would go wonderful with a fish dish like shrimp or crab cakes, a platter with pork tenderloin mini sandwich with a sauce or mini beef sandwich with a horseradish sauce. You really don't need much more than that. You have all your vegetables with some meat or fish.
I made a delicious buttermilk peppercorn dip and I would like to share the recipe with you.
1 cup of sour cream
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 teaspoons coarsely ground mixed peppercorns (green, pink, black) (I put these in a zip lock bag and rolled over them with my rolling pin several times)
3 teaspoons minced chives
1/2 teaspoon finely chopped fresh thyme
1 clove minced garlic
1 large shallot, minced
salt to taste
Place all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well. You can serve immediately but I think it is best if it sits for several hours. You can store in the frig for up to 48 hours. If it is too thick you can always thin it a bit with a little buttermilk.
Depending on how many people you are serving, I would suggest to at least double this.
No comments:
Post a Comment