Hosting a Sophisticated Dinner Party

Break out your fancy dishes, get ready to show your sophisticated side, and gather together your best dinner party ideas. Plan the guest list, menu, decorations, and music in advance to throw the perfect dinner party. Take advantage of these sophisticated ideas for dinner parties and become more familiar with how to host a dinner party.

• Guest List: Plan your guest list based on the amount of available space in your home or venue and your budget. Invite family, or a specific group of friends, or both. Decide in advance whether or not the guest list will include or exclude children.

• Menu: Decide on the menu, and how much food to make based on your guest list. Consider the food preferences and any food restrictions of your guests. Create a theme for the dinner based around the menu. Add some wine and hard liquor as additional dinner party ideas for adults. Choose from a variety of dinner party themes, such as:
  • Fondue: Create an interactive meal and have guests dip meats and bread into cheese and dip fruit, cookies and cake into chocolate.  
  • Moroccan: Serve kebabs and couscous to set a unique and tasty scene.
  • Under the Tuscan Sun: Pour a delicious Italian wine to start. Serve pasta for the main course and cannolis for dessert.

• Decorations: Tie the decorations into the dinner party theme. Choose your decorations based on the dinner party theme ideas represented in the dinner menu. Choose opulent fabrics for the table cloths for a Moroccan theme. Incorporate deep, rich colors such as magenta, blue, gold, and purple. For an Italian dinner party, decorate with the colors red, green, and white. Decorate for a fondue party based on the table setting. Decorate a circular or oval table, and be sure not to block the chocolate and cheese fondue dips.

• Music: Play music during the dinner party to enhance the ambiance. Consider classical music for the fondue party by Andrea Bocelli or Yo-Yo Ma. For the Moroccan party, play Middle Eastern, exotic music by Amina Alaoui or Henry Azra. For Italian music, play songs by Lucio Battisti or Claudio Baglioni.

Hosting a dinner party should not be overly stressful. Have fun planning a dinner party, and give yourself a chance to enjoy the food and company. Create your event on Punchbowl to access a beautiful collection of free dinner party invitations!