Healthy Make-Ahead Party Recipes [Hot Double Spinach Dip]

I love to go out on New Year’s Eve. Now, I don’t love crowded bars or busy hotel celebrations, but I like to celebrate special occasions, like New Years’ Eve, at friends’ parties and going out to dinner. I love an excuse to get a little dressed up and have a night out.

Brad, on the other hand, loves the Ohio State Buckeyes. and they happen to be playing in The Fiesta Bowl on Saturday night. Suffice to say, we’ll be spending New Year’s Eve in and not unsurprisingly, I’ve been spending a lot of time planning our New Year’s Eve menu. Last week, I shared some of my favorite New Year’s Eve recipes on CBS Chicago with Marissa Bailey.

If you want to start the new year on a healthy note, preparation is power. Each of these ideas have one thing in common: they are each super easy to prepare and in most cases, make ahead, using fresh Organic ingredients from the O Organics line at Jewel-Osco.

O Organics’ mission is to make a wide variety of USDA certified organic foods affordable for all. O Organics features more than 300 items for every occasion throughout the store—from fresh fruits and vegetables, to wholesome dairy and meats, cereals, snacks and more.

In Chicago, O Organics is available exclusively at Jewel-Osco stores, but you can also shop at Albertsons Companies stores across the country, including Albertsons, ACME Markets, Vons, Safeway, Shaw’s,  Tom Thumb, Randalls,  Pavilions and Star Market.

Miniature Mac and Cheese Cups

I love macaroni and cheese and O Organics offers a white cheddar macaroni and cheese that’s so easy, Brad makes it (he’s partial to macaroni and cheese of the boxed variety). For a party, make miniature macaroni and cheese cups, loaded with a parmesan-breadcrumb topping and finished off with your favorite fresh herbs.

Three Cheese Berry & Arugula Pizza

When I attended the Organic for All event with O Organics earlier this year, there was a portion of the event where we split off into groups and used O Organics products to create some fresh new recipes. Someone made this and oh holy yum.

You can recreate it with O Organics Three Cheese Pizza. Top the pizza with about 1/4 cup O Organics Frozen Mixed Berries, and a big handful O Organics Baby Spinach or Mixed Greens. Slice up a red onion, top with your favorite nuts and O Organics Balsamic Vinegar and bake according to the package directions.

Serve it whole for best presentation, or slice into bite-sized squares.

Tomato Basil Bisque Shooters

Brad and I both love soup, but it’s not exactly easy to serve at parties, especially parties where you’re doing a buffet or passed apps style. Round up your shot glasses — or if you can’t find shot glasses, buy candle votives for $1 or less each — and serve mini shooters of O Organics Tomato Basil Bisque topped with O Organics Feta Cheese, O Organics Goat Cheese and your favorite O Organics Herbs (sage, rosemary and thyme are in my fridge as we speak).

Hot Double Spinach Dip

One of my favorite dips is hot baked spinach dip. It has all kinds of good stuff in here: O Organics Shredded Italian Cheese blend, O Organics Sour Cream, and O Organics chopped spinach, to name a few. You could easily customize this to your liking by adding chopped artichokes, roasted red peppers, tomatoes, or water chestnuts, but I kept this pure and simple: all spinach.

When I made this on the CBS morning show, the crew went nuts for it and I won’t pretend that I haven’t been eating it for lunch ever since I retested the recipe to post on my blog. Because it’s so veggie heavy and most of the ingredients are from O Organics, this is a dip you can feel good about eating. Serve with baby carrots or other chopped veggies, or O Organics White Corn Tortilla Chips for a treat.

Thank you to Jewel-Osco for sponsoring this post. All opinions are my own.