Starry snacks and sips to help your Flag Day guests Raise It Up!

By Tory Altman, NMAH

This summer, we're celebrating the 200th anniversary of the Star-Spangled Banner with Raise It Up! Anthem for America. On Flag Day, Saturday, June 14, at 4 PM EDT, people around the country will pause to sing our national anthem. Many organizations and families are already planning parties and programs to turn the whole day into a celebration! And what goes better with a patriotic party than some star-spangled snacks?

Try out a few of these simple recipes, courtesy of the museum's Head Chef William Bednar, to keep your group fed and festive all day (and don't miss these starry sweet snacks I've also blogged about):

Star-Spangled snacks
Defenders Deli Tray:
Use equal amounts of your favorite "red" deli meat—you can use ham, salami, roast beef, whatever you like—and your favorite "white" cheese—Swiss, white cheddar, fontina, brie. Fold up your individual slices or bunch them together and lay them out in alternating lines, remembering to leave a block of space in the top left corner.

Fill this corner in with whatever kind of "blue" extra you think will match your meat and cheese. Try olive tapenade, blueberry preserves, or use a little food coloring to turn some mayonnaise blue! That's a feast fit for the defenders of Fort McHenry!

Broad Chips and Bright Dip: 
Use red, white, and blue corn chips either laid out in rows or all in a bowl together. Break out the salsa, the queso, or the tzatziki!

Pickersgill Pizza:

Pickersgill Pizza
You can make your patriotic pizza entirely from scratch or entirely from the store.

You’ll need pizza crust dough, pizza sauce, shredded mozzarella cheese, pepperoni (or tomatoes for a vegetarian version), and black or kalamata olives. Prepare your dough and sauce in advance. Using a rolling pin, roll your dough out in the shape of a rectangle, but remember to make it small enough to fit on a pizza stone. Using a ladle, spread your desired amount of pizza sauce on to the pizza.

Then, it's time to decorate! Sprinkle the whole thing with shredded mozzarella. Use your pepperoni or tomato slices to lay out stripes of red across the mozzarella, remembering to leave a small rectangle of space in the top left corner. Spread your olives in that top left space. Use a star-shaped cookie cutter to cut out a few stars from the slices of mozzarella and lay them on top of your olives. Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes or until the crust is golden brown.

Now that's a pie Mary Pickersgill, who led the group that sewed the Star-Spangled Banner, would love!

Smoothsonian Smoothies—Makes 4
(So named because Smithsonian staffers gobbled these up before the photo shoot was even complete.)

Francis Scott Key smoothiesIngredients:

  • 4 cups vanilla yogurt
  • 1 cup strawberries, frozen
  • 1 cup blueberries, frozen
  • 6 oz (12 tbsp) honey
  • 6 tsps vanilla extract

Combine 1 cup of yogurt with strawberries, 1 oz honey and 1 tsp vanilla extract in a blender and blend until smooth. Pour into the four glasses in equal amounts. Combine 1 cup of yogurt with 2 oz of honey and 2 tsp vanilla extract and pour into each glass in equal amounts. Combine 1 cup of yogurt with blueberries, 1 oz honey and 1 tsp vanilla extract in a blender and blend until smooth. Pour into the four glasses in equal amounts. Combine remaining yogurt, honey, and vanilla extract and top off each glass. Keep cold until served.

Perilous Punch 
Wet your whistle before singing the anthem at 4 PM! Add strawberries and blueberries to a pitcher of your favorite party drink to add some stars and stripes! Top off each glass with a Starry Straw.

Red, white and blue juice

These savory snacks are even more delicious when paired with sweet ones. Check out these recipes for a few Flag Day sweets.

Victoria "Tory" Altman is an Education Specialist in the Office of Education Outreach. Before 4 PM EDT on Flag Day, you might want to find out why the anthem is so hard to sing and learn seven things that might surprise you about the Star-Spangeld Banner before joining us for a nationwide singing of the national anthem on June 14 in honor of its 200th birthday.