Book Club Party

By Mindy Kobrin

Award Winning Book Club Party

It's your turn to host the book club. Last time the group ordered pizza and served soda. This time, turn the book club meeting into a book club Celebration by making a few tasty bites and cocktails. Spruce up the living room with some quick decorating tips. Be careful – the book club may never meet anywhere else again!

Atmosphere

Be sure you have enough chairs and pillows on hand to keep your guests comfortable -- just because you’re reading doesn’t mean it has to feel like school. Decorating for your book club depends a lot on what type of book you read.

Gothic Book Ambience

For a gothic novel: keep the lamps on low and light a lot of candles instead.

For a tear-jerker: decorate with tissue boxes and aromatherapy candles.

For a crime thriller or mystery: recreate the game Clue-- place props such as a rope, knives, candlesticks, wrenches, magnifying glasses and other whodunit items weapons peaking out from drawers and bookshelves -- anywhere they’ll be noticeable but not actually injure somebody.

Visit your local library and decorate the shelves and coffee table with books from the author you’re reading or biographies about that author. Not only will the books help set the mood, you can thumb through them to look for topics to help your discussion.

Tunes

Classical music, soft jazz or lounge music makes great background music that doesn't compete with your conversation. Try and play music that matches the theme or era of the book.

Here are some gems to enhance any book club party:

1. Symphony no 5 in C minor, Op. 67 - Beethoven
2. Hear my words, ye people - Charles Hubert Parry
3. May Be Fact Or Fiction - Wynton Marsalis
4. Social Soft Shoe - Wynton Marsalis
5. Carmen - Bizet
6. Eine Kleine Nachtmusik - Mozart
7. The Four Seasons: Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter - Vivaldi
8. Buddha Bar IX
9. Turandot: Nessun Dorma
10. Rhapsody in Blue - Gershwin

Conversation

Book Party Prep

When you're planning a book club party, you want to think about ways to enliven the conversation. If the book is a dud that leaves you little to discuss or debate, you can really save the evening if you plan ahead.

Look online for discussion guides, and search for reviews of the book. When the conversation lulls, ask a question from the discussion guide or read aloud a review and ask if people agree or disagree.

Another way to bring the book to life is to ask the group which actors they envision in the main characters' roles. This sparks new topics and lets you see if your assessment of the characters matches the rest of the group's.

Drinks, Nibble and Noshes

The food or desserts you choose to serve at your book club party depends on how much you want to spend and prepare, and whether there's a dominant theme in the book.

You can plan your nibbles around the setting and meals in the book. For example, Jeffrey Eugenides' main character in his book Middlesex is Greek. Serve up some Greek salad, sweet baklava and ouzo. If reading Anchee Min's book, Becoming Madame Mao, dish Chinese nibbles like egg roll, General Tso's Chicken and fresh lychees. (This is great for no-fuss take-out)!

Don't be afraid to share your party cliffnotes with Celebrations. I'd love to hear about the books you and your friends read and cannot stop talking about over good nibbles, drinks and dinner parties.

John Berendt's critically acclaimed southern tale Midnight In the Garden of Good and Evil was my inspiration for this charming southern menu. Happy Reading!

Menu
Sparkling Water, Green Tea and Coffee
Shirley Temples and Bookmaker's Luck
Hot Crab Dip
Ham and Pecan Tea Sandwiches
Bloody Mary Soup Shots with Shrimp and Pickled Vegetables

Shirley Temple(non-alcoholic)

• 4 to 6 oz. Schweppes ® Ginger Ale
• 1 oz. grenadine
• 1 oz. lime juice
Maraschino cherry and Orange slice

Pour ingredients over ice in a highball glass. Cheers!

Bookmaker's Luck (serves 1)

• 1 oz. vodka
• 1 oz. white rum
• (to taste) lime juice
• (to taste) orange juice
• (to taste) ginger ale
• 1/2 oz. creme de bananas

Pour vodka, rum, lime juice and orange juice into a cocktail shaker half-filled with ice cubes. Shake well; strain into a highball glass one-third-filled with ice cubes. Fill the glass with ginger ale, top with crème de bananas, stir once, and serve.

Hot Crab Dip
Servings: Makes 1 1/3 cups.

Ingredients
One 4-oz package cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
1/2 teaspoon Old Bay seasoning or other seasoned salt
6 ounces fresh or canned lump crabmeat, drained

Preparation

Preheat the oven to 350°F.

Place all the ingredients except the crab in a medium bowl and blend together with a spatula.

Stir in the crab. Turn the dip into a 1-quart casserole and bake, uncovered, for 30 minutes, or until heated through.

Serve it while it's hot with crackers, bite-size pieces of bread, or veggie sticks. It can also be presented in a bread bowl and served with a tray of fresh broccoli, carrots, zucchini, or crackers.

Deviled Ham and Pecan Tea Sandwiches

Ingredients
1/2 pound cooked ham, cut into 1-inch pieces
1/2 medium onion, quartered
3 large sweet gherkins
1/2 cup pecans, toasted and cooled
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
1/4 cup mayonnaise
16 slices firm white sandwich bread
Garnish: chopped fresh parsley and pecans

Preparation
Pulse all ingredients except bread in a food processor until finely chopped and combined well. Spread ham mixture (1/4 cup per sandwich) between slices of bread. Discard crusts, then cut sandwiches into triangles. Makes 32 tea sandwiches.

Bloody Mary Soup Shots with Shrimp and Pickled Vegetables
This tomato-Worcestershire-vodka soup gets served in shot glasses for fun. Look for the pickled veggies near the jarred vegetables in the supermarket.

Ingredients
32 peeled deveined cooked medium shrimp
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, divided
Pickled vegetables (such as carrots, celery, green beans, and olives)
1 28-ounce can San Marzano tomatoes in juice
2 green onions, chopped
1/2 cup (or more) low-salt chicken broth
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoons vodka
1 tablespoon prepared horseradish
1/2 teaspoon celery salt

Preparation

Toss shrimp with 1 tablespoon lemon juice in large bowl. Thread 1 shrimp and 1 vegetable on toothpick. Repeat with remaining shrimp and vegetables.

Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Place tomatoes with juice, green onions, 1/2 cup broth, Worcestershire sauce, vodka, horseradish, celery salt, and remaining 1 tablespoon lemon juice in blender.

Cover; blend until smooth. If mixture is too thick, thin with additional broth by tablespoonfuls. Season Bloody Mary mixture to taste with salt and pepper.

Transfer to pitcher. DO AHEAD: Skewers and soup can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and chill. Pour Bloody Mary mixture into shot glasses or small glasses. Garnish each with shrimp-vegetable skewer. Makes 8 servings