"Heavy hors d'oeuvres"

I'm having a Holiday cocktail party, and would like to convey on the invitation that the food will be substantial enough to sub for dinner.

I've seen the above phrase on invitations I've received, but I'm wondering if any of you have seen a different way to say it.

Any input is appreciated! Thanks!

"Substantial" or "filling" have a slightly less obese connotation.

Abundant?

Oh, and what is the menu, and what time should we be there?

[Jenise]

I'm having a Holiday cocktail party, and would like to convey on the invitation that the food will be substantial enough to sub for dinner.

I've seen the above phrase on invitations I've received, but I'm wondering if any of you have seen a different way to say it.

Any input is appreciated! Thanks!

I haven't seen any other way, and it does get the point across. I'd go with it.

Thanks all!

I haven't completed the menu yet but you sure are welcome to come!

[David M. Bueker]

Print it on paisley paper & it will take on a whole new meaning.

I think the word you want is "hearty."

??

Frank

I'm thinking the word/phrase you may consider is ample and you may want to use another term rather than hors d'oeuvres (which sound small). Tapas or small plates might put your point across better.

I recently had an invitation to a similar event and they called it "Small plates and Dessert" And yes, there were small plates to fill with the large assortment of appetizers, which included grilled shrimp, empanadas, hot dips and crackers, crudites with dip, stuffed mushrooms and so on. The format worked very well for people to really get out there and mingle.

Great suggestions.

I like "small plates".

Thanks everyone, and if you're in Iowa on the 18th, swing on in!

Tapas [/b]or small plates might put your point across better.

Well said Jo Ann! Tapas or small plates indicate, to me at least, something more than appetizers but not a huge meal either.

Not specific to this invitation, but related, and maybe enjoyable too: Through much food-related reading I've encountered extreme situations related to this one. They seem mostly to happen in Russia. Here is one I used elsewhere in reviewing and recommending Nicolaieff and Phelan's English-language Russian cookbook. It refers to the myriad traditional "appetizers" associated with ("Inseparable from!" rebukes Tatyana Tolstaya) vodka.

Zakuski can be a great trap. When Melba, the famous soprano, went to supper with the tsar . . . very hungry after singing at the opera . . . she innocently and eagerly applied herself to the magnificent buffet, which included every kind of hot and cold hors d’oeuvre. She had just reached saturation point when dinner was announced.

This experience, in more modest form, has befallen many unsuspecting foreigners visiting a Russian house for the first time. When you find a table covered with beautiful dishes you naturally assume it to be the main meal. Too late you discover that soup with piroshki and pork fed for weeks on Hungarian wine are waiting in the kitchen till appetites have been suitably stimulated.

The Russians laugh kindly at protests but expect you to go on eating, like the host in Gogol’s Dead Souls, who rebuked his guest for lack of appetite . . .

-- Nicolaieff and Phelan (1969)