Outclass the Competition
by Harold Almon
Be at Ease School of Etiquette Austin
512-821-2699
Jalapeño bagels: bagels with jalapenos atop them: buy them by the bag. Separate each can cost .85 cents and up. A bag of six of the same can be had for $2.89; thank you Jeff. A bagel may be served cut in halves or quarters. You could get and serve bagel minis. You may have bagels sent through the slicer for the middle and two sides to be cut. You can eat the slices like this or make bagel crisps.
When making only one half of a bagel, (one waffle,) or one slice of toast at a time, each is to be placed in the side of the toaster designed to only do one slice. Look for the picture on the toaster now, or always make toast at least two pieces at a time.
Baguettes can be used as crusted bread for snacks and trays. I have baguettes sliced, first into fourths, then have two fourths sliced lengthwise and two fourths sliced widthwise. For this, you may use a Rustic baguette.
Informal breads can be used at the dinner table. It is not etiquette. Informal buns are made for burgers and franks, and sliced bread is for breakfast toast and sandwiches. To make someone remember this as a treat you have got to do something awesome with the sauce or the meat.
Informal breads may include Gata, Lakshee, Lavash, Manaesh, Mardoc, Naan, and Tandoori. Each can be served with cocktail foods, as can others you already know.
Pita may be used as bread or chips for dips and spreads. Each can be sliced or quartered. You can serve pretzels, rye, and sesame flatbread, or bread sticks.
Learn the wonders of hard bread: French, Tuscan toast, Black bread, and toast cut outs, etc. Let each person tear off a piece of bread from a loaf, or if you would like, at the bakery, have it sliced.
Air popped popcorn can be made as cocktail food served warm, and lightly salted with nutritional yeast and or buttered with coconut oil. Popcorn can be made by micro-wave and served; it just needs to be popped outside of that bag.
You could serve whole wheat crackers, or some kind of grain of choice as a signature cracker for cocktails, cheese and crackers, or cheese and egg canapés. And yes everything can fit better on a round cracker. You can mix them to be Sociable. Saltines crackers are for soups or for when you are at home alone. Do everything to avoid serving cracked crackers, when you can. You could snack on or with seasoned croutons.
A breakfast bread, corn muffin, or a popover can be served with coffee.
Frugal tip: What you are going for here is fiber: the part of the plant the body cannot digest or absorb. Fiber is roughage: used to get other things through and out of the body. It is said a high fiber diet can lower your cholesterol, (and help keep you thin.) Dairy here could be used to bind food as fiber nudges things along ever so gingerly. Add fiber slowly to your diet to avoid gastrointestinal discomfort. Work up to 35 grams per day (gradually).
Note: baked grains can contain transfat. How would know? If you bake or buy a grain product today and tomorrow you do not have to throw it away, it probably contains transfat.
Where there is a grain there you can add a legume such as hummus, peanut butter, refried bean dip, or refried bean dip hummus. For a complete protein, you can make the room. For each complete protein where there is no green, you can serve something fermented. Here it can be a form Olives, peppers, or Greek yogurt.
Pizza is not a snack. It is an incomplete part of a meal plan. Pizza is to be served from a platter to a plate. Informally Pizza is to be served from a Pizza pie stand, on a platter (albeit cardboard) or one taken out of a box, every boxed pizza box used to come with one. And it is to be served to a plate placed center each place setting. It can cost more than a traditional main course. You can get a pizza stone, no rise dough, no cook sauce, hummus or tomato, some toppings of choice, and every eight to ten minutes make a thin crust one of your own. A pre-made one can be made crisp by being baked while placed on a stone or a tortilla frying pan. It may be reheated in a microwave. Pizza is a grain and still needs sides, preferably one that is a legume. It can be made with hummus as its sauce or served with hummus as a side. Pizza can be topped with salad: arugula, cherry tomatoes, cut in half, and drizzled with extra virgin olive oil. It can be topped with seeds, seasoned croutons, garbanzo beans, vegetables, and or with protein bits. You may serve a Fruit salad of melons and other cut up fresh fruits with pizza. You could serve a great soup (casually in a mug,) with or without being topped with oyster cocktail crackers. Pasta with a healthy sauce might be served with it. It may be angle hair spaghetti. Pizza served alone can be a snack or a cocktail food. It may be cut into small squares or 3” round sliders cut in half and plated as such. Pizza squares, (crust) or bread sticks may be served with hummus as a side or dip. Get a pizza slicer. Get a picnic basket; keep in it an Italian Love Me Kit. Share the contents and a complete protein or meal with friends.
Tortillas can be served as snack or a cocktail food. A tortilla is essentially a food wrapper. A wrapper when seated is to be used as a plate. Tortillas are essentially bread that is made of fat cut into stripped wheat flour that is served half done. When hot items are placed inside it, it starts to return to goo. Wheat is to be fully cooked. Yes, they know, that is why it is cooked when you order a Burrito bowl. You could open up your Grande Burrito. Use a knife and fork and enjoy the inside. Get out the good stuff, and then decide if I want to eat that gooey flour, that is left on your plate. You can leave it there and stay thin enough to enjoy your date. You can use your Tortilla as bread. You may order a corn tortilla instead. Tortillas were traditionally made of corn. Search engine this. Love cooked corn tortillas, chips, and corn chips with or without dips. A Burrito is a meal wrapped in a tortilla. Burritos are foods for a working man on the run. Each used to contain only one item and was a whole lot smaller. This may not be frugal; now, for the cost of a meal with one, you can buy a whole cooked rotisserie chicken, and some sides. The same can be said for any burger. Still there is that place for a tortilla as a grilled quesadilla. Each can be stuffed with turkey and brie, shrimp & pesto and mushroom and goat cheese, or chicken and cheese, sliced in wedges and served with salsa. This is frugal – kinda.
Waffles might be warmed up with an in place toaster. Waffles are for toasting but are also fun eating. And waffles can be stored frozen. Breads thaw within three minutes. Each can be cut in squares, toasted, topped as served with cocktails.
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