Everybody loves a dinner party and they are excellent times to
get your friends or family together and reconnect or celebrate.
A great idea to keep in touch with your friends is to have a
dinner party night set up on a regular basis. You can have
friends visit your home one-week and you can visit theirs the
next. These are great for keeping in touch with your friends as
well as celebrate with each other. Dinner parties are also
excellent celebrations for birthdays, anniversaries, new
babies, and other life events.
Dinner parties can also take on different themes. Murder
mystery parties are especially popular with you have enough
willing participants. You can also have food style themes such
as soup parties for the winter months or Thai dinner parties
for an exotic twist. Whichever party you choose you want to be
certain that you have an excellent menu and some fine wine.
A simple dinner party with friends is the easiest to plan. If
you know your friends well, then it should be relatively simple
for you to plan the menu. Invite your friends over for a nice
Italian dinner or whatever type of food you choose. Be sure to
keep it casual and you may even ask them to bring their
favorite wine or wines. You will also want some great dessert
planned and perhaps even some fun games for after dinner. These
are great and casual parties that allow you to just kick back
and enjoy being with friends. Perhaps next week they will
invite you over for dinner. These types of parties are also
great alternatives to going out to eat, as you get to try
different styles of cooking without breaking the bank.
A formal dinner party can also be a lot of fun. Sometimes you
just like to dress up and have some fun. The menu should be
something special and not something that you all eat on a
regular basis, however, the meal should be easy to prepare so
that you are not in the kitchen all night and not able to enjoy
the company of your friends.
Once you have your style figured out, you will need to begin
planning how much time it is going to take to prepare the meal.
You want to have plenty of time to conversate with your friends
and you want to have time to enjoy the meal yourself. Be sure
to plan ample time for cooking, visiting and cleaning. You also
need to consider who is coming and if their diet has any
restrictions. You may have some friends who are allergic to
shellfish, so your Shrimp Scampi might not be the best recipe
idea. You may also have friends who are vegetarians, so your
New York Strip steaks might not be a great idea either. Be sure
to plan plenty of time for grocery shopping and recipe
preparation or adjustments.
For a more formal affair, you may choose to print out small
menus and invitations to your dinner party. If so, your
preparation will need to begin early enough so that you are
able to announce the party and ensure that all guests are
invited and able to RSVP in time. You may also need to purchase
special paper for menus and invitations. You will also want to
be sure that your guests are compatible. Do not invite
individuals that may not get a long together and be sure to
invite those who will be disheartened if you don’t invite them.
Try to invite people with the same interests so that there will
be a good flow of conversation.
Next, you will need to determine how you are going to serve the
food. Are you going to allow guests to serve themselves via a
buffet in your kitchen or are all dishes going to be sat on the
table. For a formal dinner party, you may plan to have all
plates prepared and delivered to guests sitting at the table.
Cooking can be stressful. If you are making a new recipe, you
may want to make it a week before as a test. If you can make
your dessert the night before you will also save a lot of time.
Another excellent idea is to prepare cold appetizers and
desserts so that they are not taking up precious oven space. If
you feel that you are going to be in the kitchen for a while
invite your guests to hang out and pitch in the preparation of
the meal. You can chat, have a glass of wine and your guests
will have a good feeling of being helpful. Besides, people love
to watch other people cook.
After the meal be sure to offer mints and a nice liqueur or
dessert wine. Coffee is also excellent with dessert and will
sort of give finality to the meal. Use this time to ask your
friends what they liked and disliked and how you can improve
the recipes.
About the Author:
Jim Roberts is a writer for The Wine
Standard, a wine store that carries a wide variety of wine
gifts such as wine openers, wine glasses, and many more fun
wine accessories. Jim branches off and writes about a wide
variety of topics from articles such as this, to planning the
perfect getaway weekend vacation. Jim is passionate about
creating valuable content that readers can continue to enjoy
for years to come.
