If you have decided to throw a dinner party to rekindle with your family, friends, partner, or colleagues, this article will help you to get the thing done right. It is not only the food that will impress your guests but also the table setting and aura you will create for the party. Follow the tips to be the Monica Geller of your group and flaunt your OCD like nobody’s business.
How Can You Prep For Your Dinner Party?
Hosting a party is not a joke. There is a lot that goes behind setting things correctly and maintaining the party spirit. Here are some tips that will help you host a diner gala.
1. Invest Your Time To Set The Table
Your dining table will be the focal point of your dinner party. Do not leave any stone unturned. Ensure that you have a perfectly laid down table. There are numerous ways you can set your table. Choose a theme and then develop ideas around it to get started. Keeping it simple will help you as there will be moments when people want to pass dishes from one side to the other. Having a clumsy table might result in spillage.
Numerous themes are depending on the occasion. You can place flowers and candles if it is a romantic date. Halloween dinner parties can have spooky table covers, runners, and accessories with pumpkin or spooky motifs. And the list is endless.
When you are selecting the color pallet, choose white dinnerware, and you can invest in wholesale dinner plates. The specialty of white dinnerware is that it will complement any table setting.
2. Be An Excellent Mixologist
Beverages are another exciting part of a dinner party. While you are selecting the beverages, keep non-alcoholic options for the teetotalers in your group. Besides, your guest might have to drive back home. Having too much alcohol is not the best option.
You can curate amazing mocktails and cocktails with minimum ingredients available in your pantry and be a rockstar mixologist, minus the juggling skills.
3. Match The Alcohol With The Food
Just because you are a great cook, mixologist, and big short spender when it comes to alcohol doesn’t mean that the course will turn out best. When you have good quality liquor, you must ensure to cook food that will complement them and vice versa.
If you have Scotch, cooking lamb chops, pork, beef, or other variants of red meat in a smokey flavor will complement and respect the strong flavors of Scottish whiskey. People with mild taste buds can invent a good quality Japanese whiskey that is milder. Sushi, white meat, and seafood taste excellent with Japanese whiskey. The list is endless. You can head towards Google or Youtube for interesting information about liquors and food that pairs best.
4. Check For Food Allergies
Ask your guest about any kind of food allergies they might have while you are inviting them. As the saying goes, precaution is better than cure. You don’t want to spend time cooking the best turkey of your life on thanksgiving and later find out at the dinner table that your guest is vegetarian.
Some people are allergic to nuts, prawns, shellfish, etc. Ensure that you do your studies before indulging your time in cooking, only to end up in a compromised situation at the dinner table.
5. Set Up A Theme
Setting a theme will impress your guests instantly and make your dinner night more special and impressive. Choose the decoration, food, and music, it will help you narrow down your options.
For instance, for a summer evening serve mimosas, tapas, and paellas and make a playlist with guitar music. If it is winter, serve a glass of scotch and compliment it with smoked beef or pork ribs. Further, you can use Christmas motifs and neutral colors for giving a wintery aura.
6. Prep Everything Beforehand
Decorating your dinner table is not only preparation you need to take, you need to time get ready for yourself too. The best way to have some time to spend time on yourself prepare the food and table beforehand.
Chop vegetables, prepare the sauce, and set up the table so that you get enough time and no rush during the dinner eve.
7. Less Is More
If you are a good cook then there are chances that you can go overboard with the cooking but if you can not spend on the presentation, it might be a shame. So to save time in preparation opt for fewer dishes.
8. Leaders Dine At Last
If you are arranging the dinner party then you will be the captain of the whole tribe, ensure that you serve everyone first. Serving your guests at first will make sure that they can have everything that they need before you start dining. Ask everyone what they need and attain them at once. An impressive host is a gracious host.
9. Go Seasonal
When you are serving dinner ensure that you serve healthy and tasty food. Serve something that has mangoes if it is summer, a dish that has oranges in winter, and so on. This will impress your guests and fetch you extra points for tuning in with the seasons. Also using products that are in season will make the food taste far better as they will have their best flavors.
Finishing Touches
No matter how simple your food is, investing time in the presentation will make any dish special. Add some extra touches here and there while plating the food to impress your guests further. For instance, you can place a basil leaf on the slice of cake or ice cream you will be serving. It will make the dish look aesthetically pleasing and Instagramable.
Conclusion
With all four tips in your mind, you rock your dinner party. It can be intimidating to pull a dinner party. But if you have the will, you will certainly have a way. Be it Thanksgiving dinner, Christmas dinner, anniversary dinner, or you name it, these tips are contemporary and will help you when you want to host. Adding a little return gift when your guest leaves will add a touch of thoughtfulness and gratitude you have for having these people around you.