Need HELP for Husband's 40th birthday party.

Hi all! I am throwing my husband a surprise party! (Shhhh!) I decided I wanted to do food with a theme and have decided to have food from each decade from the time he was born. I think I have the 60's covered with fondue and a couple of other items. I am kind of stretched for ideas for the 70's right on up to today. You folks are the experts, so what can I serve for each decade? Any help would be greatly appreciated. THANKS!

I remember when Frozen Yogurt came out. I thought it was the most brilliant invention next to toilet paper.

The hotel room - I am renting a room at Residence Inn has a full size fridge along with a stove and microwave. I can use the fridge if I decide to do this.

and anything blackened, Paul Prodhomme was big in the 80s

That would be easy and I can heat them in the stove or microwave. Not sure what someone could bring that would be blackened. I would have to give that some thought. How about wings? Would they represent the 80's? 90's?

He is a huge Starbucks fan. Although I am not sure we need that on a day where it will be high 60's/low 90's outside.

Wish I could tie that into the number 40 - his gifts will have a theme of '40'. For instance, a 40 year old wine, 40 ouncer, a $40 gift certificate, etc........

wines? - try here - 1968 wines - http://www.bizrate.com/wine/wine-vintages--1968/products__att297043--5235-.html

how about a newspaper from his birthday - http://www.namesandpoems.com/birthdaytimes.htm

or a Time magazine cover from around his birthday - http://www.time.com/time/searchresults?from_month=01&from_day=01&to_month=12&to_day=31&search_type=cov_year&year=&year=1968&year=

1970s . . . California rolls, Tiramisù

1980s . . . Watergate salad, monkey bread

Don't forget taco salad for the 1960s

Good luck! It sounds like a fabulous party.

what in earth is monkey bread??? LOL. I like the Watergate Salad idea...a lot! I also like your other ideas. Thank you for posting them. I will definitely put your thoughts to good use.

the Monkey Bread recipe. I remember my neighbors making it all the time. And yes, it uses the famous bundt pan! LOL

MONKEY BREAD

4 pkgs. Pillsbury rolls (not buttermilk)
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. cinnamon
1/2 lb. butter
2 tbsp. cinnamon
1/4 c. sugar

Separate rolls and cut each into fourths. Combine 1/2 cup sugar and 1/4 cup cinnamon. Roll pieces in this mix. Melt butter and stir in 2 tablespoons cinnamon and 1/4 cup sugar.

Grease Bundt pan. Place half of biscuits in pan, then half of melted mixture, then remaining biscuits and remaining melted mixture. Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees. Turn over pan and eat while warm. Pull apart with fingers

This sounds awesome.

I googled "cuisine by the decade" and found this:

http://www.foodtimeline.org/fooddecades.html

hubby just walked in the room. Thanks!

Lots of good reading there. Thanks.

Back in the 60s, it was either brown rice and seaweed or Rice a Roni with nothing much in between, a depressing decade for foodies. We watched Julia but we hadn't quite figured out what to do with what we'd learned. The 80s were all reduction sauces and the 90s featured "tall food," edifices of delicately balanced ingredients on a plate that nobody was quite sure how to eat. I'd call the 00s the decade of the dot, with dots of sauces arranged around the now blissfully shortened arrangement of foodstuffs in the center of the plate, like dots of sauce around one seared scallop pearched atop a bed of julienne veg. Either that, or you can do a coffee granita made with Starbuck's finest for dessert.

"Fondue became very popular in the United States during the mid-1960s after American tourists discovered it in Switzerland."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fondue

I only correct this because - and I do this knowing I am aging myself - but my wife and I had our first fondue in the late-60s.

It didn't filter down to us proles until the early 70s.

I was there, remember?

However, as a new Air Force second lieutenant, we were far far away from any trendy upper classes.

Anyway - we certainly did enjoy the lingering dinners around fondue. It did get Americans to begin to spend some time with their meals rather than shoveling the food in as fast as possible.

And as a side benefit, you got a chance to drink a bit more wine as you waited for your little piece of meat to finish . . . or not. or to search for it on the bottom as it fell off your little green-dotted skewer.

I made spaghetti sauce or drip beef sandwiches in it. Macrame was huge--oh, and plant parties.

I'm seconding the 70's for crock pots and fondue sets.

late 80's sushi

90s the craft/home brewing era starts booming!