My Semi-Homemade New Year's Eve Party

If you, like me, are addicted to the Food Network then you have no doubt at one point or another come across the show Semi-Homemade Cooking with Sandra Lee. I have to say that she drives me crazy with her "No one will ever know it's semi-homemade" and her outfits which are somehow color coordinated to her set decorations and table decorations which somehow magically change with EVERY episode. Who has the time (or money for that matter) to do that for every party they throw? In spite of my frustration with her show, however, I couldn't help but think of her when I designed my New Year's Eve party menu this year because everything I made involved at least one pre-packaged item. And although she annoys me, I have to give credit where credit is due - it sure did make my party prep a whole lot easier.


First and foremost, the cocktails - I wanted to make a champagne cocktail in honor of New Year's and I found a bottle of Creme de Cassis in my liquor cabinet, so I decided to go with the Kir Royale, which simply consists of one glass of champagne and a tsp (or more to taste) of Creme de Cassis. Super easy yet elegant looking, so right up my alley.

For my first appetizer, I decided to go with smoked salmon toasts, and just like the cocktails, these really couldn't be easier to put together. I picked up some store bought smoked salmon, pictured here:

then assembled these toasts:

using the following recipe:

Smoked Salmon Toasts

one baguette
one 4 oz package smoked salmon
sour cream
chopped chives (you could also substitute fresh dill for the chives)

Cut baguette into slices. Broil at 500 F for approx 5 minutes (until toasted but not burnt). Spread each slice of toast with about 1 tsp of sour cream. Top with one slice of smoked salmon and sprinkle chopped chives on top.

For my vegan guests, I made a variation on another Food Network star's recipe, Giada de Laurentiis' Polenta Squares with Mushroom Ragu. Instead of making the polenta from scratch (as Giada's recipe suggests), I purchased store bought, ready to serve polenta:

which I then cut into rounds and broiled for about 5 minutes at 500 F. I then followed her mushroom ragu recipe, but substituted portabello mushrooms for cremini mushrooms and omitted the butter and flour combo and instead used cornstarch to thicken the sauce (so that I could keep the recipe vegan). It worked well and no one missed the butter at all.

Mushroom Ragu

1 Tbsp olive oil
8 oz sliced portabello mushrooms
1/2 cup white onion, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
2 cloves garlic, minced
3/4 Marsala wine (I used a non-alcoholic Marsala cooking wine)
1 tsp cornstarch

Heat oil in frying pan over medium heat. Add mushrooms and onion, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and saute for about 8 minutes. Add garlic and saute for 2 minutes. Decrease heat to medium-low and add marsala. Cover and simmer for 5 minutes, or until wine has reduced by half. Add cornstarch and stir to incorporate. Cover and let simmer for 2 minutes or until sauce has thickened. Remove sauce from heat and spoon over polenta.


(I apologize that the picture is not so great due to my shadow covering the food, but hopefully you can get the idea).