Many people are looking for ways to cut back on their expenses. With so many things increasing in price, it’s now more than ever that you have your friends around. For anybody that’s starting to worry about finances or cut back on their worldly expenses, one of the best things we can all do as a way to have a cheap and cheerful gathering, is to have a dinner party. But there is still some dinner party etiquette that we can all benefit from knowing. What are some of these golden rules?
Keep the Wine Flowing
This is not always an easy thing to do, especially if you are trying to stock up on wine for a dinner party with at least 8 guests, but you can ask everybody to bring a bottle if you are going to do all the cooking yourself and pay for the ingredients. But you have to make sure that you can keep everything nice and chilled. If the fridge is full because you’ve been preparing your food, you can always use wine cellar refrigeration units that look fantastic and will keep the plonk nice and cool.
Prepare the Food Ahead of Time
There will be things that you will need to serve fresh, for example, vegetable side dishes but there’s a lot you can do to get ahead of the game. You don’t want to be cooking and preparing when your guests arrive because you want to be there to entertain. You may need to spend some time in the kitchen on the finishing touches, but if you want to make the most of the ambience, you need to spend a bit more time before the guests arrive preparing everything.
Have Three Courses
A dinner party should encompass a starter, main, and dessert, but depending on the guest list, you may want to rethink the three-course approach. One of the best things you can do is to a spread of food and have people pick and choose what they want. It doesn’t have to be like buffet food; you can choose an amazing array of dishes like paella, pasta, or couscous dishes. When you have everything set up on the table, people can pick and choose what they want to eat and there will be no opportunity for you to get offended if they don’t eat much of what you serve up. But if you go for the starter, main, and dessert approach, you can always keep it simple with picky things, and have a dessert that you’ve pre-made chilling in the fridge.
Make It About the Conversation
Some people feel like a good dinner party should have a proper structure. The reality is that having a dinner party in this day and age, conversations will inevitably turn to what is going on in the world. And rather than letting the conversations drag the event down, let people get these concerns off their chest and enjoy the amazing food you have prepared. Dinner parties can be stressful affairs, but they don’t need to be. Some of these simple golden rules can make a big difference.