Childrens partiy food- What have you been your most successful dishes?

[mrsruffallo]

Anything that was a real hit?

Party Ring biscuits. Yyyyuuuuummmmmmmmyyyyy.

Oh hang on, they're really for me not the children...

Strawberries always seem to go well. And breadsticks with dips - children seem to like dipping things in goo.

Anything they can make themselves. We had a pizza party - provided the bases and some passata and lots of different fillings and the dc's did their own.

Ditto with decorating little fairy cakes

I have done the pinwheels too, and stuck cocktail sticks in them to hold them together, whipped out at the last moment.

And "magic" lemonade. Put a teeny drop of food colouring (use different colours) in each cup. Pour the lemonade in as you go round the table and whoosh...magic lemonade.

I have dd1 party next month so am making note of all these ideas... many thanks.

oh ffs qUALIS EGGS

Problem with quails eggs Frovol?

Dawley - it is a bit fiddly, I try and sort of peel the whole shell off in a spiral rather than in pieces like a hen's egg, and do it under a running tap. And the shell is fairly soft so it's not as offensive when a bit gets overlooked.

Gemmie - love the magic lemonade idea!

Rofl at this.

Stuff you can buy in a packet from the shop and put on the table for them to scoff before going back to playing!

Grapes, cocktail sausages, crisps, biscuits, cakes. Chocolate spread & white bread sandwiches. Party rings and hula hoops. Drinks in cartons.

And don't feed them till nearly the end of the party so they're going home when the sugar rush hits.

Oh but I really like cooking and making special birthday stuff fruitful - if you find it a PITA, fair enough but I love it.

Also our parties for DS tend to have a lot of our adult friends at them too, and I like to make nice stuff everyone can enjoy. One thing I don't like at all is being at a child's birthday party where there is a spread of wotsits, froot shoots, sweets and bright green cakes for the kids and nothing for the parents as they stand around watching. IMO you want some wine and fab nibbles at a party. Well I do.

I agree muffle. I did a birthday picnic for my dd (3) yesterday. It was a lot of work, but it went down really well.

Also, when there's nothing but crisps and cake it does mess up the evening a bit. They're sort of full, but haven't eaten anything proper and so they're grumpy and it's a pain. It ovbiously isn't the end of the world, but it's just so much nicer when they've enjoyed a lovely tea of proper food and they come home full and happy.

Cheese slices cut with cookie cutters

Lunch on a stick -- skewers with cherry tomoato, slice of cucumber, cube of cheese, rolled piece of ham/turkey

Celery with cream cheese

Sausages cooked in mango chutney

I do the nigella-style number biscuits, but to make it easier cut the dough into circles then press the number cookie cutter in the middle (enough for an imprint, not to go all the way through). Much quicker and easier to get off baking sheet.

For my sons 2nd birthday I went to town on the food. All the 'healthy' 'good' stuff was ignored for mini fairy cakes and good old jelly with squirty cream and 100s & 1,000s. The mums faces were a picture as they tried to give the kids carrot sticks and they were almost knocked over when I brought in the jelly!

I do parties on Sat morning. They can go home and have another lunch if they want. And I don't do parties until the kids are old enough to come by themselves.

I used to do lovingly crafted home-made fancy birthday cakes, until I realised they really wanted the plasticky ones from Tescos ...

These are all brilliant - thank you!

Any more for any more?

Sandwiches cut into teddy, star and dog shapes. Yes, I actually do this and Lakeland has a cutter that makes dinosaur shaped ones!

muffle and fluffyduck - I so agree. I love putting on parties for the kids and adults to enjoy together, and I like being creative with the food (although obv it not everyone's 'thing', and thats fair enough too).

Apostrophe - love the sparklers idea! DD's 5th birthday is in a few weeks, I will try it then.

It's to be a 'flower party', so we are having sandwiches, cheese, cucumber, ham and carrots all cut into flower shapes. Also fairy bread cut with a flower cutter, fruit kebabs (or fruit platter, depending on time) and flower shaped cookies. I'll do some dip and crudites as well, and enough of the flower sandwiches for the adults and kids.

Cake decorated with fondant flowers around the side and DD's name piped on the top.
I have a vague notion of making flowers on stems out of carrots/cucumber flowers stuck onto the tops of pretzel sticks...but I will have to see how this goes.

King prawns in filo pastry
Crab claws
Chocolate fountain
Mini jellies in cool moulds
Cupcakes made to look like toadstools or green aliens

Astrophe - I have a children's birthday cakes book and there is a gorgeous flower one. It's a white rectangular cake - imagine it orientated portrait style, with iced grass at the bottome and flowers made with individual fairy cakes, each one iced as a different flower. Does that make any sense???

I love the idea of icing all the fairy cakes to look like flowers.

littledawley - I can't picture it. Are the fairy cakes on top?

Yes, if you imagine the white cake as an A4 piece of paper with grass iced on the bottom edge with stalks leading up to a cupcake flower. Now obviously the picture is taken from directly above so looks great. I thought that you could make fairy cakes but slice the bottom off them, ice them then stick them on.

Still not making much sense....

That's easier - have put a photo on my profile page!

Thanks littledawley! looks gorgeous...food for my thoughts