Food Network Feature: Mess Free Cocktail Hour Foods

Time to share another Food Network feature with you! While many of these have been up on FoodNetwork.com for over a month, I really didn't want to bombard you all at once with essentially 100 images/concepts that we have been hoarding since fall. But reality check: internally I'm like LOOK AT THIS COOL STUFF IMMEDIATELY, because it's hard to keep it inside for that long (Do not Michael Scott me Office fans.). So again, I'm trying to space these out with other content for you all, but it's Friday. And I hope you're having a party. Here's how to keep said party relatively mess free (...before your guests start drinking. I make no promises beyond the second glass of wine and cannot be held accountable for your sloppy friends.). 

11 Mess Free Foods That Are Perfect for Cocktail Hours

For this concept, before we planned the foods for each shoot we had to come up with rules. What makes a food more mess free than others?

• No red wine sauce or tomato sauce. So if you do spill, no big deal. That being said, I did include a honey mustard in one of the images with pretzel bites, but come on. You can't have a plain pretzel. Try hard not to make a mess. 

• It needs to be low in grease. Greasy fingers= accidentally touching fabric. 
• It needs to be bite sized and or not crumbly. Because you know what is the absolute worst? Having 3 bite appetizers that crumble down your dress after bite one. And if you're more well endowed, you are not getting those crumbs out until after the party. Boob crumbs are no fun.
• Ideally, the spread also needs to have a good macro nutrient balance. If you're only feeding guests low fiber carbs, they're going to keep being hungry and that's more chances for bad attitudes and more mess. You need fiber, fat and protein. That's why this spread contains a few meat options like satay and shrimp.