140 party recipes

Halloween Ghosts in the Graveyard dessert with chocolate pudding, crushed Oreo dirt, and whipped topping ghosts. No-bake party favorite kids love decorating themselves.

Stilton and cream cheese stuffed between toasted pecan halves for a savory, crunchy appetizer bite. Five ingredients, endlessly snackable, and perfect for cocktail parties.

Parisian Sophisticates: almond-vanilla buttermilk cupcakes hollowed out and filled with airy chocolate truffle mousse, topped with toasted cake crumbs. Vintage tea-party fancy.

An easy lamb canape: crisp celery-seed toast strips spread with a quick cooked-lamb-and-mayonnaise mixture and topped with pimiento. A smart, retro party bite for using up leftover roast lamb.

Flourless chocolate Chambord cake: a dense, fudgy dark chocolate cake spiked with black raspberry liqueur. Gluten-free dessert for Valentine's Day, dinner parties, or anytime indulgence.

Trout fillets baked in parchment parcels with julienned courgettes, carrots, mangetout, herb butter, and fresh mint. An elegant en papillote dish for a dinner party.

Triple-cheese ball rolled in toasted almonds and fresh parsley. Cream cheese, sharp cheddar, and cold pack cheese blended into a rich, nutty party appetizer.

Concentration candy cookies: brown sugar-pecan cookies topped with matched pairs of colored candy-coated chocolates. A clever kids' memory-match game cookie for parties.

Tricolor Boboli pizzas: prebaked crusts topped with olive tapenade, caramelized red onion, red peppers, goat cheese, and toasted pine nuts. A 1990s Mediterranean dinner-party shortcut.

Curried beef meatballs with almonds and water chestnuts, fried crisp and served in a sweet-and-sour pineapple curry sauce. A crowd-pleasing appetizer for parties.

Seafood pasta salad with rotini, shrimp, bay scallops, artichoke hearts, roasted red peppers, and olives in an anchovy-Parmesan vinaigrette. Crowd-feeding cold salad for parties and picnics.

Peanut butter cookie pops made with a buttery peanut butter dough, rolled thin and cut into shapes, then sandwiched with candy melts on lollipop sticks. Great for kids' parties and bake sales.

Gift cake: a birthday sheet cake decorated to look like a wrapped present, with coconut "paper," strawberry preserves filling, and a gumdrop bow. Perfect kid's party centerpiece.

Filled lemon cookies sandwich thin, buttery shortbread rounds with a bright lemon filling. Slice-and-bake icebox dough with a tea party finish dusted in powdered sugar.

Beef and rice meatloaf rolled jelly-roll style around a sweet peach and dill filling, brushed with peach syrup as it bakes. The retro pinwheel that turns ground beef into a dinner-party showstopper.

Famous Bundt rum cake made with yellow cake mix, vanilla pudding, and dark rum in both the batter and a buttery rum glaze. A boozy, moist party cake with chopped pecans.