There’s no better way to level up your movie night than with the perfect spread of homemade snacks. Whether you’re hosting a girls’ night in, planning a cozy date night, or just binging your favorite series solo, these movie night snacks hit every craving—sweet, salty, crunchy, and cheesy.
Once or twice a month, I host a movie night. As an avid snacker and romcom enthusiast, I take these casual events as an opportunity to obsess over planning interesting snacks. I occasionally succeed in forcing people to rewatch old favorites with me, but that’s irrelevant. At the end of the day, it’s really about coming up with an exciting but yet concise and cohesive snack menu.
I spend an awful lot of time on Pinterest and flipping through cookbooks anyway, overfilling my mind with elaborate recipe ideas and menus, so it’s nice to put this exquisite skill to good use.
The Menu
We were a small group of girls, therefore settling on a movie was easy: Uptown Girls. That meant the night was about nostalgia and feminine elements. I quickly figured out how I wanted it to look: two light savory options and one cute dessert.
For our savory snacks, I kept things extremely simple: a prosciutto chips tower and marinated olives and feta cheese.
The tower can be assembled right before serving and it takes approximately fifteen seconds. The marinated olives can be made ahead of time and warmed right before serving, so there’s zero stress involved when putting them together.
Admittedly, the dessert is slightly more difficult, but nothing you can’t handle. It sounds fancy and complicated because it’s French, but it’s basically puff pastry layered with pastry cream.
Both components can be made ahead of time and the dessert can be assembled before serving – it’s probably better that way. If you want to make things even easier for you, go ahead and get store-bought puff pastry.
My oven was acting up that day and mine didn’t turn out as thin and crispy as I would’ve liked, but I’ve made it many times before and it’s quite easy.
The Movie
Uptown Girls is a gem of a movie, absolutely delightful. It’s a feast for the eyes when it comes to style and the details. And that includes the food.
Early on in the movie we’re presented with a fabulous snack board Molly hastily puts together for Neal – the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach after all.
Then, of course, we have Ray’s lovely little tea party that starts with cute plastic scones and ends with a quarrel. It’s the perfect movie to watch with your girlfriends.
I was very pleased with the snacks because not only were they so low-effort and manageable to make, but they also worked great visually. And in terms of cohesiveness, I think they worked really well together.
The mille-feuille looked like they could be served at Ray’s tea party and although she wouldn’t have approved of the chips and all the butter, I think she would’ve appreciated the prosciutto and the olives. The menu is a bit of a French and Spanish fusion, so it’s half casual, half fancy. Molly would’ve loved everything, I’m sure. I know we did.
The prosciutto tower and marinated olives can be easily eyeballed, which is the spirit of movie night snacks – keeping things as flexible and easy as possible.
For the mille feuille, I made Claire Saffitz’s puff pastry recipe and a traditional pastry cream recipe that I’ll share soon. But I’ve made Sally’s recipe before and recommend it!
Now that you’ve got the snack situation handled, all that’s left to do is hit play! Let me know your favorite snack in the comments—or tag me on Instagram if you recreate one of these!
Ingredients
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 chilies (you can also use 1 tsp red pepper flakes), cut in half lengthwise
a few sprigs fresh thyme
1 clove garlic, thinly sliced
4-5 strips orange zest, removed with a vegetable peeler, plus orange juice
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 cup olives (preferably Castelvetrano)
1 cup feta cheese, cut into cubes
Directions
Heat the olive oil in a small saucepan or skillet over medium heat. Add the chilies, thyme, garlic, orange zest, salt and pepper to taste.
Cook, stirring occasionally, until the garlic is pale golden, about 2 minutes. Stir in the olives and cook, stirring, until just warm, about 2 minutes. Turn off the heat. Stir in about 2 tbsp orange juice.
Add feta to a serving bowl. Pour olive oil and olives over feta and mix to combine. Serve warm or at room temperature.
Ingredients
1 bag potato chips (14oz)
about 4oz Prosciutto
1/4 - 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
olives, chopped (about 5)
freshly ground black pepper
Directions
On a serving platter or plate, layer ¼ of the potato chips with prosciutto and Parmesan. Continue layering until you run out of chips and prosciutto. Garnish with a generous amount of grated Parmesan, olives, and freshly grated black pepper.
@heythereannao movie night snacks!! #movienights #fyp
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