Convention Hospitality Room Dishes

The Spring state convention is this weekend; so what do I bring for the Hospitality Room?  My husband and I would drive to conventions and we bought an igloo cooler that could be plugged into the car cigarette lighter and then adapted to regular electricity in the hotel room.  We were then able to travel with things that would be available at home for entertaining.  The following recipes are some of my favorite suggestions for entertaining and taking to the Hospitality Room.

picture from billscottgroup.com

I have two favorite dips for parties and usually my daughter makes the spinach dip that is served in Round Rye Bread that is hollowed.  The dip is poured into the hollowed out part and the bread that was pulled out is then broken  up into bits around the bread.

I find that the dip is gone before the bread and the bread is then left to be thrown away.  My suggestion is to put the dip in a shallow bowl and then slice the bread into larger cubes so that there is less to throw away.

It has been my experience that vegetable trays although popular to bring are not ones that are eaten at parties.  I'm always looking for ways to use the leftover vegetables.  When I saw the above photo for illustration, I was intrigued by the notion of combining a popular dip with a tray that may or may not be eaten. Once the chunks of bread are gone, this tray offers a second choice for the dip.

My second favorite dip is one that my friend shared with me a few years ago at Christmas time.   It is a very tasty Shrimp Dip that you make with salad size shrimp.  I make this shrimp dip more than just at Christmas time because everyone in my family seems to like it.

I had bought an extra pound of shrimp when I made the Macaroni Shrimp Salad .  This is a good place to use it even though it is sometimes hard to find the salad size shrimp at our local market.

Another great dip is a crab spread which is made with cream cheese and seafood cocktail.  This one can be taken to the convention and made there since the cream cheese needs to be room temperature.  It can be served with crackers around it or in a serving tray by itself.