You Say Poker, I Say Party

I don't like playing cards. Math is hard, and cards have numbers, and numbers mean math; hence, playing cards is hard. You have to do math and stuff.

Instead, if a playing card party comes up, I immediately default to the party aspect. So, when Chuck decided to have a group of guys over for Poker Night, I happily volunteered to plan the spread.

When straight, card-playing, beer-drinking men are your target diners, the following should inspire your menu:

Meat. Bread. Meat. Cheese. Meat.

REPEAT.

I'm broadly stereotyping here, but that's why stereotypes exist: there's some bit of truth to them. At risk of only serving delivery pizza (which did arrive at some point) and chips, the Fellow had to take it up just a notch...but not so far as to scare these guys.

Trade in standard pigs in a blanket for chicken apple sausages
wrapped in crescent roll dough, coated in cooking spray and
sprinkled with poppy seeds. Oink, indeed.

Guys like things they recognize, especially when they're gathered in packs, so I defaulted to 2 of my more manly appetizers: Mini Sweet BLTs and Chicks in a Blanket. Because, straight men love bacon and chicks. Period. 

Flipping a "pig" to a "chick" in a blanket is easy. Instead of buying hot dogs, opt for pre-cooked chicken sausages, also in the meat section. Chicken sausages come in lots of flavors including chipotle, cajun, and my personal favorite for this recipe, apple. Wrap them in crescent roll dough and bake according to the dough's directions. You'll want to cut the sausages and the dough into smaller pieces; as guidance, one pack of 4 sausages + 1 tube of crescent roll dough makes 16 pieces. I serve these with whole grain mustard on the side.

Bacon. Needs no introduction.

Besides chicks in a blanket, there's nothing easier than Mini Sweet BLTs.

MINI SWEET BLTs

• King's Hawaiian Sweet Rolls (12 pack)
• 1lb of thick-cut bacon (the "B" in BLT)
• Arugula (the "L" in BLT)
• Roma tomatoes (or smaller tomatoes for the "T")
• Sun-dried tomatoes (in oil), diced and added to regular mayo

Fry the bacon. After, simply assemble each mini BLT with 1 roll, 1 - 2 slices of bacon, a tomato slice, a bit of arugula and a slather of sun-dried tomato mayo. I recommend holding these together with a toothpick.

I'm not bluffing; we had a full house for poker night,
and this spread was all in.

After putting out the last dish of chicks in a blanket, I grabbed my coat and bid adieu to the boys. "Wait," they said. "You're not staying for poker?"

"Poker?" I said quizzically. "Gents, enjoy your tasty snacks. That was the fun part for me. Now, I'm going to drink wine with the girls."

Cheers!