A fresh start

• Easy Red-Pepper Dip, featuring POM Wonderful juice reduced to a syrup and blended with roasted red peppers (duh!), walnuts, spices and olive oil. Served with pita bread.
• Guacamole, with pomegranate arils threatening to outshine my beloved avocado
  
• Chickpea and Mint Crostini, packing a ton of flavor with chickpeas, mint, scallions and more arils
  

Three. It's such a great number. I really feel like life is better when things come in threes - unless it's anything to do with traffic violations or bathroom stops in a race.

For my POM Wonderful party, I knew I wanted to have some munchies for the guests to nosh on while I prepared the game-time eats. I nearly went with just two - the Easy Red-Pepper Dip and POM Wonderful's recipe for Pan-Toasted Brie but the brie seemed a bit fussy for football and our crowd. Three dips would be better. For the guests and my time.

And, between you and me, I made it even easier on myself by using pre-made guac, stirring in the arils before setting out the bowls. Sue me. Of course, Mark had to tell me just how great the guac was and then snub his nose at the chickpea crostini. He's lucky he got to sleep anywhere but the couch last night.

Up next: Side kicks and the main event.