Hors D’Oeuvres: Retro Horses Doovers

Old Style Horses Doovers For A New Year

My mother rarely made canapés or spiced nuts to have with drinks before dinner, Triscuits and cheese or Planter’s Mixed Nuts were standard nibble fare. But she did serve for special occasions seasoned cream cheese wrapped in dried beef (the American version of Bresaola) and they were pretty tasty. My brothers and spouse vacuumed them up off the serving dish whenever they appeared. Although he waxes rhapsodic about pigs in a blanket,  which he wolfed down at parties, I don’t remember his mother ever making any sort of hors d’oeuvres either, but then my father-in-law eschewed fancy cocktails. They followed a more strict Southern tradition of bourbon-based classics – highballs and old fashioneds, cigarettes and then a really good dinner as she was an excellent cook. 

Discussions about such food memories lead Victoria, our sharp-penciled editor, and me to reminisce about parental parties and trendy nibbles that were popular in our youth. (We did have one, you know.)

Cigarettes & Cocktails

“My folks entertained only occasionally, but I loved their parties.  It was my job to put the mixed nuts and butter mints in footed dishes and stock silver cups with hospitable handfuls of Camels and Kents.  My mother let me in on a family secret — one beloved relative who had lots of kids and little money used to bring an empty cigarette pack to parties and fill it from the cups on the coffee table. It just made me love him more. 

I remember polishing the silver and putting out the good china even though food was, in truth, pretty much beside the point. My mother was an anxious cook, thrown into a frantic state when asked to contribute a chip dip to someone else’s cocktail do. She eventually threw garlic salt into a container of sour cream and called it a day. 

 For cocktail parties, alcohol and hilarious company were the big draw. Guests were dear friends who happened to be writers, artists, cartoonists, and zanies of all stripes, including one gifted trombonist. I was once awakened in the wee hours by a raucous rendition of “When the Saints Go Marching In” as a trombone-led second line snaked through our slumbering suburban neighborhood. This was the kind of fun that made me want to be a grown-up. 

For me now, food is very much part of the delight of entertaining. I started wondering what one of those vintage parties would have offered up as hors d’oeuvres, prepared by a more self-assured hostess. Some of these tidbits have emerged, disappeared, and re-emerged over the decades, as food combinations go in and out of fashion. 

I dove into some old cookbooks and retro recipe sites to find the gems and the horrors.  There were a few howlers that deserved to disappear. Think: lemon gelatin, beets, and crushed pineapple; or cocktail franks in a mix of pineapple, sauerkraut, ginger snaps, and currant jelly. Couldn’t do it. But, never fear, we have found some that should, once again, come up for air.”

Martha Strikes Again

One forgets that the ever-present and continually self-reinventing Martha Stewart (including her 13-year friendship with Snoop Dogg) started out in 1976 as a small caterer in Westport Connecticut. Maybe that’s where she honed her spinach triangle skills. This recipe omits the dill or mint found in some versions and uses leeks, which gives a more subtle onion flavor. And fresh spinach makes it better, too. I remember eating these at parties in the ’60s and ’70s and then they disappeared off the cocktail map. We’re bringing them back! 

North Meets South

Pimento Cheese is something that eluded my understanding. I think most of my friends in my youth used to buy it the way you bought onion dip with chips. But when Vicky made this version from the Lee Brothers, which was adapted from their recipe in The New York Times, both my Southern husband and my Northern self could hardly stop slathering it on our favorite sourdough crackers. While it is considered a Southern specialty, its history actually goes back to…..New York! Newly imported pimentos from Spain collided with some upstate farmers’ version of French Neufchâtel, and then cream cheese manufacturers took over. Early versions came in little jars that we re-used for juice glasses.  The concoction slid South when enterprising farmers there grabbed an economic opportunity by growing their own pimentos, smart cooks added cheddar and mayo  — and what’s been called “Carolina Caviar” was born. I, for one, am thrilled it’s crept its way back into Northern hearts. 

It’s A Wrap

These were a bridge and cocktail party staple, and part of the era’s massive urge to wrap food in other food. Think chicken livers in bacon, wienies in packaged biscuit dough, and this nifty little trick with boring cocktail olives. In researching the different types of red pepper stuffed olives (Americans shortened the Spanish name of this red pepper from Piemento to Pimento) I found out through USA Today that the cheap red stuffed olive is actually a “slurry” of red pepper, gum and other stabilizers that is pumped into the pitted olive.  You get what you pay for. You will enjoy Julia Reed’s endearing article she wrote in the The New York Times Magazine in 2003 that accompanies this recipe. A trip down memory lane with delightful fashion notes. 

VIctoria Sackett and Nancy Pollard