Ingredients: 

Fresh Mozzarella balls

Burrata 

Fresh basil

Cherry Tomatoes

Sliced large Heirloom Tomatoes 

Olive oil

Garlic

Salt and Pepper 

Lemon juice

Method:

Set oven to 350

Put tin foil on a shallow baking tray

Roughly chop garlic and cheery tomatoes.

Mix garlic, cherry tomatoes and fresh basil in a bowl then layer on the tin foil lined trays.

Sprinkle with salt and pepper, olive oil and balsamic

Slow roast for an hour or until the ingredients have been reduced to a lovely tomato jam.

Blend the mixture into a pure and put in fridge to set up.

Chop Heirloom tomatoes into ½” disks liberally salt and pepper them.

Cut mozzarella balls in half – squeeze lemon juice over them, Salt Pepper and a dash of Olive oil. 

Loosely break up Burrata with hands, so it an be layers later. Also salt, pepper, lemon and olive oil it. 

Place ring mould on serving platter.

Layer sliced Heirloom tomatoes

Fresh Mozzarella balls

Torn fresh basil

Another layer of heirloom tomatoes

Burrata

Top this all off with the tomato jam and some more fresh basil for decoration. 

Ingredients:

Mashed avocado

Fresh crab or sushi grade tuna

Chopped mango

Chopped chilis or red peppers if you don’t like heat

Cilantro

Shallots

Mayonnaise

Shiso Leaf (Japanese Mint Leaf) Sub Mint if you can’t find the Shiso

Lime juice

Hot sauce (your fav – I use Tabasco)

Sesame seeds 

Rice wine vinegar

Salt and Pepper

Olive Oil

Method:

Finley dice the shallots and chilis.

Let them marinate in a small bowl of rice wine vinegar (Takes the heat and raw onion flavor down a notch)

Remove the avocado flesh from its skin, put in a bowl with salt pepper and lime juice and cilantro - mash.

Add crab, mayo, lime juice, hot sauce salt and pepper, and sesame seeds to a bowl and toss together delicately. 

Drain the chilis and shallots from the vinegar mix.

Make your third layer with diced fresh mango, torn shiso leaves, shallots and chilis. Mix to form a salsa.

Layer avocado, then crab then salsa into the ring mold – chill.

Ingredients:

All amounts of each beverage should be done to taste and the alcohol tolerance of your guests ;)

Black vodka (Bev’Mo, or Whole Foods)

Pineapple juice

Ginger Ale

Red Sugar Glitter

Champagne Flutes

A table spoon

Method:

Choose grand hopefully antique or thrift store silver serving tray.

Pour Red sugar glitter into a shallow dish.

Dip Rim of each glass into warm water.

Dip glasses in the sugar then place on the tray when you have a lovely red rim on each glass.

Mix pineapple juice and ginger ale together, then pour into each glass filling just over half way.

Place a table spoon into each glass, round side down, with the tip touching the inside edge of the glass, just above the top of the first layer. Then slowly pour the black vodka onto the back of the spoon, so it lands on the pineapple juice layer but doesn’t mingle. Raise the spoon up as the second layer raises in the glass. Remove the spoon slowly to preserve the layers. 

Chose a neutral table cloth color like black and layer with a runner – preferably in white or cream or gold – try to restrain yourself from conventional colors like orange! 

Also height and layers. If you have a light fixture above your table – hang something from it. 

Mix and match goblets or chargers, as long as you have two of each thing it’s OK to match – if every place setting is different you lose your theme and it looks like a mess.

Low lighting is key. Turn off all over head lights and make pools of light with side table lamps and candles. A safe option is battery powered candles for the table, so no one gets burned passing dishes to each other. 

Add books under your table cloth to create levels to the eye is forced to travel over the food dishes and décor, in a more purposeful manor. 99c stores are you friend – avoid the taky stuff but always keep your eyes open for a well done piece that you can layer in, like beetles, pumpkins and animal skelatons.

Thrift Store are your better friends! The trick to elevating garish Halloween decoration to a refined soire, is mixing “antique” (cheap silver platters that look vintage) dishwear and serving bowls with cheaper more readily accesable masks, snakes, spiders.