A guide to healthy appetizers

It's always party season! You can have a party for any reason at all. In order to make your party great you need to have great food. However, how much do you need? There are some good rules of thumb you can use when you are estimating how much food you will need for your party.

Are you planning a casual party with appetizers or a formal dinner? Your decision will affect the amount of food you need. For a full dinner, you should plan for at least a pound and a half of food per guest. If you are doing finger foods only, you should plan for about a pound of food per guest. Take into account that your final numbers will need to be adjusted if your friends have a big appetite or not.

When eating finger foods, the average person tends to eat approximately 5 pieces an hour for the first two hours they are there. Figure in three more per hour after that. So, you would need approximately 130 appetizers for a party of ten people that lasted three hours. If you are also providing a meal, you can serve fewer appetizers.

If you like fondue, this is a great party appetizer. You should plan on a single guest eating about 20 bread cubes that are 1 inch each in size. This is about half of a French bread loaf. If you are serving other foods for fondue, consider that one person can eat 6 ounces of seafood, 4 to 6 ounces of cheese, 4 cookies, or 6 to 8 ounces of meat, fruit, or veggies. Be sure to prepare generously... it is better to have leftovers than not enough.

For beverages, you can figure that punch will serve about ten people per gallon. That lets each guest have three servings in a standard 4-ounce punch cup. If you think your guests will be extra thirsty, you may want to make a bit more. If you are planning on serving cocktails at your party, you will want to plan for around two drinks per guest per hour for the first two hours, and then one drink per guest per hour.

Many people like ice in their drinks. If you are providing iced drinks, consider that you will need about 1 pound of ice per person. If your party is taking place in hot weather, you will need to take this into consideration and provide even more ice. Stock up on cocktail napkins to accompany appetizers or provide small paper plates to cut down on the number of napkins needed.

Keep some appetizer party recipes on hand to start your party off right. Everyone loves to nibble a little. It starts the party and gets people talking. You can make most of them a day or two earlier. Always plan your party well in advance to keep everything on course.

If you are hosting an impromptu party, be sure to keep the ingredients for a few easy recipes on hand so you can quickly throw them together. This means that your guests will not arrive to an empty table.