May Day Luncheon

This would be a great way to celebrate the first flowers of spring. May Day is traditionally May 1st. Why not invite your friends to a May Day Luncheon? The foods could be as easy as finger sandwiches and lemon-aide but I am going to give you a recipe for a really easy and simple quiche and ideas for decorations that will make your May Day party an easy success. In these times we need to remember to celebrate the simple things and a small party could be just the thing to brighten everyone's mood.

First, let's talk about decorating your table. Back in the day, girls of all ages danced the maypole. So for our center piece we are going to make a Maypole centerpiece. Take an old terra cotta pot or small basket and fill it with stones. Take a piece of leftover PVC pipe and wrap it with silk ivy. You can get this at Walmart for about 2 dollars. You want an ivy garland. Just hot glue it in several places as you wrap. Place into basket. You may want to put a piece of Styrofoam in the bottom to stick this into depending on the size of the stones you are using. Cover all of this with a little Spanish moss. Tuck in some silk flowers at the bottom to decorate it. Take one small Styrofoam ball and cover in small flowers your choice but I love rose buds. Leave a small amount of the bottom uncovered as you will now take ribbons and evenly space them around the bottom and let them hang down. Attach the ribbons with pins or hot glue. Depending on the tallness of these you will want your ribbons to be at least 2 inches longer so they can be stretched out and fanned out and taped to your table top with a little invisible tape.

Cover your table with a plastic pastel table cloth. You can decorate this with flower stickers if you want. Pull out your prettiest china but if you don't have any most party stores or Walmart do sell flowered paper plates. You also can usually find them at the dollar store. Buy some dessert size plates. Fold them about three quarters of the way up making sure that the colored side is on the outside and make a pocket. Hot glue or staple the edges. Now hot glue some of those leftover flowers to the front of each pocket and make a small bow to go over the stems. Now put your silverware and a napkin in each and set them out for each guest as a silverware holder.

Now on to the food. As I said before, the menu can be as simple or as elaborate as you would like. If making finger sandwiches, take a simple shaped flower cookie cutter and cut out your bread. You can even use wheat for one side and white or rye for the other. Now fill with your favorite sandwich filling like egg or tuna or ham.

Serve with fresh fruit tray or Vegetable tray. You could also buy tomatoes, one for each guest, and core them out to make a small basket and fill with crab or pasta salad from your deli. If you want to really make some fancy food, here is my recipe for quiche.

Basic Quiche

Ingredients

• 1 lb. of Swiss cheese
• 1 lb. of Monterey jack cheese
• 8 large eggs
• 4 cups of milk
• 3/4 cup of flour
• 1/4 tsp of pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg

Directions

Mix the eggs with the milk. Stir in the flour pepper and nutmeg. Pour into two 10 inch Deep dish pie shells. Bake at 400 degrees F for one hour or until a knife stuck in the center come out clean. This makes a plain cheese quiche. Now comes the fun part the add ins.

We have made this with shrimp, crabmeat, spinach, or ham. So add any of these ingredients or a combination to make a wonderful quiche.

• 1/2 cup chopped green onions
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• 1 10 oz package of spinach
• 1 pound shrimp or seafood shreds
• 2 cans of crabmeat
• 1 lb package of ham lunch meat cut into shreds.
• 1/2 pound mushrooms cut into chunks or slices
• 1/2 cup of green bell peppers diced
• 1 package or can of fresh or canned asparagus chopped

Serve this with dinner rolls or croissants. Fresh fruit cut up makes a nice a compliment. I also love Lemonade in the spring so here is a recipe for quick raspberry lemonade.

Raspberry Lemonade

Ingredients

• 1 can of frozen lemonade
• 1/2 package of raspberry Kool-Aid
• 1/4 cup of sugar

Directions

Mix well and serve over ice.

There are several flowers that are edible that you could float in your lemonade like pansies or violets. Just make sure that the flowers have been grown organically so that you know that no pesticides have been sprayed on them.

Happy May Day to one and all!