You may be a person who enjoys entertaining at home. For example, you may desire to host classy, elegant dinner parties. With that said, you may also not move forward on your desires because you feel you don’t have the budget to host a classy dining event. In fact, there are tips you can utilize to have a truly classy dinner party on a budget.
Inviting Your Guests
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Even in this digital age, mailing invitations to a more formal or classy dinner party at your home typically is the way to go. Many people balk at mailing invitations for two reasons. First, some people are kind of lazy and do not want to make the effort. Second, others believe that invitations are expensive.
When it comes to invitations for a classy dinner party at your home, the excuse of “I don’t feel like doing that” really is not sufficient. The cost consideration is a valid concern.
If you are having a smaller dinner party in your home, the costs involved in purchasing some premade invitations and mailing them out really is not that significant in the overall scheme of things — so think about going that route.
On the other hand, if you are planning a larger dinner party at your home, perhaps for some sort of special event like an anniversary, the costs of purchasing and mailing invites can become more significant.
If you are going the digital route with your dinner party invitations, consider doing more than just popping out an email. Punchbowl and Evite permit you the ability to craft and distribute smart-looking invitations in little time and at no cost.
As with so many things in the digital world in this day and age, Facebook has fairly solid resources that be utilized when it comes to inviting people to a classy dinner party. The social media platform has an event tool that permits you to design a sharp-looking announcement for your soiree and invite people from your Facebook friends list.
Managing Food and Beverage Costs
Even if you mail invitations to your dinner party at your home, the big cost driver for the event will be food and beverages. There are ways in which you can contain these expenses, that still permit you to host a truly classy event.
Many people like to show their culinary prowess. Therefore, there is nothing untoward with making at least a portion of the menu for your event a potluck. For example, you can designate a set of guests to bring their favorite dessert, others to bring their best appetizer, and so forth. If you want to ensure a classy touch to your dinner event, you should have the task of preparing and presenting the main entrée.
Wine is a ubiquitous part of the menu at nearly any elegant or classy dinner party. This represents another part of the meal in which you can seek contributions from your guests. You can ask some of your invitees to share their favorite wine, paying attention to the food selections that will be part of the function. (You can set a price limit so that guests do not feel compelled to overspend when it comes to their choice of vintage they’d like to share at the dinner.)
Presentation is (Not) Everything … But It Matters
A tremendous strategy you can employ for a classy dinner on a budget is dynamic, creative tablescaping. You can really give your dinner a classy, high-dollar look with simple, and inexpensive tablescaping solutions.
Select a theme, perhaps a seasonal one. With that done, you can visit a variety of reasonably priced merchants, including craft stores, and come up with the components of elements you need for an ideal tablescape. If you have a creative side, you can also design and craft your own tablescape elements for very little cost.
Dessert, Coffee & Entertainment
Yet another tactic you can employ to turn a dinner party in your home into a classy event is to adjourn to a different room in your residence (if possible) for dessert, coffee (or other post-dinner beverage) and entertainment. Entertainment can take a myriad of forms from playing a game to viewing a film, to music (even a live musical presentation of some sort).
If you really cannot “adjourn to a different space” in your home, you can clear the dinnerware from the main meal and then serve dessert and coffee in the dining room. You can include some sort of entertainment in the dessert phase of your classy dinner.
