The holiday season is fast approaching and even though the recession may soon end, people are still a bit cost-conscious in regards to party entertaining. When it comes to holiday party ideas and cocktail parties, people still desire the highest return on their investment even if it is a cocktail party where you are serving party finger foods. You can throw inexpensive yet elegant cocktail parties quickly and easily. Here are a few menu suggestions and event décor tips to help you be the host or hostess with the biggest bang for your buck.
Theme - Everything That is Old is New Again
Party Entertaining and Event Décor
- Host an open house and monitor your invitation list.
- Re-use your table linen from previous cocktail parties but add a decorative overlay or table runner.
- Purchase candles. They are an inexpensive event décor item that create ambiance and set the holiday mood. Holiday party ideas using candles include colored pillar candles and votives, hurricanes wrapped with natural greens such as holly, pine or flowers such as red roses or white hydrangeas.
- Substitute your iPod for a DJ or Band.
- Buy seasonal greens and fresh flowers at the market and create your own centerpieces or place loose greens and flowers on your buffet as accent pieces.
- Cluster groupings of flowers on your dinner table instead of buying vases.
Here is a great event décor tip combining ambiance and style for your holiday table.
- Obtain tall glass containers either square or cylinder shaped and then take one stem of a flower such as a cymbidium orchid or a grouping of roses or tulips and submerge them in water.
- Place the rocks, crystals or glass stones on the bottom of the container and stick the stem or grouping of flowers in these stones to hold the flowers down on the bottom of the container. You can also mix in lighted plastic neon ice cubes and hold them down as well using the stones as an anchor.
- Add the water and the floating candle and there you have a submerged arrangement using candles.
Party Entertaining with Party Finger Foods and a Holiday Specialty Drink
One of the many holiday party ideas you can use to help you maintain your budget when giving cocktail parties is to include an anti-pasta buffet as part of your menu. Anti-pasta stations are a great way to serve a lot of people inexpensively. Cheeses, dried fruits, crostini and breadsticks, canapés, cured meats, dips and bite-size desserts are party finger foods that are easily obtainable at any market and are fast and effortless to prepare and display. Have small plastic plates and cocktail napkins on the buffet to prevent those with eyes wider than their stomachs from taking more than they will eat at these cocktail parties. If it is a nighttime affair, serve a holiday alcoholic and non-alcoholic specialty drink along with wine, beer, sodas and waters to avoid serving a full-bar.
Below is a sample menu with food suggestions that are easy to prepare. Budget Bash has many of the recipes for the food selections listed below.
Party Finger Foods Menu with a Holiday Specialty Drink
Brie and Pear Quesadillas Flour Tortillas
filled with Freshly Sliced Pear and Brie Cheese
Array of Imported European Cheeses
Artichoke Bruschetta
Olive Tapenade
Dried Dates and Cranberries
With a selection of Whole Wheat Pita, Vegetable Chips and Sourdough Toasts
Mini-Turkey Sandwiches
Accompanied with Cranberry Chutney Relish
Roast Beef Canapés served on Thinly Sliced Toasts
Topped with Hoarse Radish Crème Fresh
Cucumber Cups
Hollowed out Cucumber Rolls filled with Salmon Mousse
Dessert
Carrot Cake Squares with Cream Cheese Frosting
Chocolate Espresso Brownies
Maple Pecan Cookies
Holiday Specialty Drink
Peppermint-tini
Finally, you may want to consider with your party entertaining an inexpensive party favor for your friends to take with them when they leave such as a small organza bag with a pine-scented candle, a sachet filled with dried holiday spices or quite simply a card letting them know in honor of their presence you have made a donation to a local charity.
So just keep in mind this upcoming December that you don't have to spend a lot of money to entertain when considering your holiday party ideas. You can host cocktail parties that include simple yet stylish event décor and low-cost but tasty party finger foods and impress your friends and family with your entertaining savvy. Remember to make it simple, delicious, stylish, fun & economical and to be a guest at your own event!
Andrea Wyn is owner of A Wynning Event http://www.awynningevent.com, a Los Angeles wedding and special event management company. She is a marketing & special event planner with over 15 years of experience and for the past ten years, she has been the event planner for the Screen Actors Guild Awards(R). She has taken her knowledge and special event experience and written and easy-to-read book called Budget Bash http://www.budgetbashbook.com where you can find more ideas and helpful tips on event planning including menus, decor, budgets, timelines, florals and more.
I'd never seen the ocean turn that particular shade of grey. I could barely discern where the steel grey waves stopped and the concrete grey sky began, especially when the boat heeled to a forty-five-degree angle.
Smash! The starboard cupboard flung open with a force that catapulted half a dozen glass vases from their shelf. They broke apart on the floor like sputtering tomato sauce on a hot stove. I had securely taped that cupboard and thought it was safe, but nothing in all my years of being a yacht chef prepared me for the violence of this storm.
For the past twelve years, I have traveled the oceans cooking onboard a yacht for discerning clientele. I have shopped in markets in the Caribbean, in the South Pacific, and in the Mediterranean. I have prepared meals for rock stars, business tycoons and movie stars. The pressure is always high and the behind-closed-doors scene is frequently chaotic, but never had I been asked to cook in such a rollercoaster of a galley before.
From my refuge on the cool marble floor, I tilted my head and studied the shards of glass scattered in front of me. I thought about pushing myself up off the floor to gather them, but I couldn't summon enough emotion to care. I just wanted to lie there until the storm ended.
Ella, our stewardess crawled into the galley, looking greener than the bowl of peas I served for dinner the night before. "They are asking for dinner at seven." Her voice was a monotone of dullness. Blue eyes normally danced like sunlight on the water, but at that moment they held about as much life as a blob of silly putty.
"In this?" I asked as we careened off the next wave. The boat shuddered as we impacted with the water below. I became airborne and wondered how the food would stay on the plate.
"I don't know. They're crazy." Ella lay down beside me as I rose to clean up the mess and start dinner.
I clutched the counter for the next wave and was thrown into the corner with the force of another drop. The oncoming slaughter of waves was relentless. A bruise formed on my hip as I braced myself for the next plunge. This was no way to create a meal. But, in the yachting industry, you never said no.
Earlier in the day, I had planned to make an Indonesian fish curry to serve with spring rolls and stir-fried greens, but sambal olek, shrimp paste, and deep-frying didn't sound like the best options right then. Did they really want dinner? I thought. Are they nuts?
But, they were the guests and technically were paying me to be in this situation, so if they wanted dinner at seven, then they would get dinner at seven. Usually dinner consisted of four to five courses served on Bulgari fine china and accompanied by high-end wines, decanted and poured into crystal glasses. The women dressed in the latest fashion with diamonds and black pearls to accentuate the look, while the men would sip martinis and exchange stock tips. It was an elegant, civilized affair. But, not that night. The frantic waves and hurricane-force winds dictated a much less formal affair. Roast chicken and mashed potatoes sounded like all I, or anyone else, could handle.
I opened a cupboard. Pots that had shifted in the storm crashed to the floor, landing on my foot.
"Ow," I muttered.
"Are you okay?" Ella asked from where she lay.
"Is that a trick question?"
I filled the pot with water, placed it on the stove to heat and turned to the refrigerator. I used my body to block any stray containers that would rocket to the floor if they too had moved. The last thing I wanted was to scramble the eggs on the floor instead of a pan. Slosh, slosh! I hoped that was the sound of the water in the pot instead of the waves outside. I secured the bars of the fiddley like strapping a child into his seatbelt to be sure there was not a tidal wave of boiling water splashing me as I cooked.
I opened the oven and immediately burned myself when I lost my balance with the lurch of the boat. I practically threw the chicken inside and slammed the door. I resumed my position beside Ella on the floor, dreading when I would have to get up and baste the bird. What were they thinking? We lay there, silent. There wasn't much to say. The boat zigged and zagged while our stomachs tucked and rolled. Ella dragged herself to check on the guests. I lay hopeful that they would cancel dinner. Ella returned and shook her head.
"Dinner's still at seven." We went back to hugging the hardwood.
Half way through the cooking time, the boat rose out of the water to a particularly dizzying height. I could feel ourselves climbing and knew this would be bad. I spread my limbs out like a star to grip the floor as we pitched to the port and dropped. The oven door flung open with the momentum. The roasted chicken left the security of the pan and sailed across the galley. Splat! It landed on the floor just a few feet from where Ella and I lay. Hot juice splattered. The bones cracked and the bird lost its shape. A wing tore off and landed in the corner. The flesh lay dismembered. Crash! The heavy copper pan hit the ground and bounced onto the roast, squishing it even further into a dismembered mess.
Ella and I just lay there staring. I couldn't believe it. That was dinner for the guests. Ella began to giggle. "I guess I don't have to carve tableside." I, too, began laughing. What else could I do? This would not be the artistic creation I usually strived for. "Maybe you can see if they would mind something else for dinner?" I looked to the floor. "Hopefully something with shredded chicken."
And, thus another adventure in the life as a yacht chef began. It is a strange thing to not be in control. I am never sure how many people I will be cooking dinner for, what they would like to eat, at what time, or sometimes, even what country we will be in. My work place moves. After an eighteen-hour day, I fall into my bunk, exhausted in Italy and wake up five hours later in France. In the past, I've spent two whole days creating an elaborate buffet for one hundred just to be told half an hour before serving that the plans had changed and they would be going to another boat for dinner. It is craziness and calamity, and in the case above, scary, but it is never dull.
Yachting has taken me to forty-five different countries to explore. I have followed my stomach into markets in Italy to find the source of the emerald-green pesto that coated my plate of pasta, and onto fishing boats in Tahiti in search of the freshest tuna for salad. I've learned to make succulent chicken and olive tagine from a Moroccan man in his kitchen in Marrakech and been shown how to roll fresh spring rolls from a giggling Vietnamese woman on the banks of the Mekong river. There is nothing boring about being a yacht chef. For me, it is one culinary adventure after another.
Spanish Basque Chicken
4 tablespoons olive oil
6 cloves garlic, sliced thin
3 yellow onions, sliced
1 chicken, roasted and shredded into large bite-sized pieces
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon Espelette pepper or 24 grinds black pepper
1 tablespoon Spanish smoked paprika
2 links Spanish chorizo, sliced into coins
4 tomatoes, diced to ½" cubes
3 sprigs thyme
1 cup chicken stock
1 jar roasted red peppers, sliced
16 Spanish green olives (large)
1 tablespoon parsley, chopped
In a heavy-bottomed sauté pan, over medium-high heat, sauté garlic and onion in olive oil for 5-8 minutes until golden.
Add chicken, sea salt, black pepper, paprika, chorizo, tomatoes, thyme and chicken stock. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 20 minutes. Gently stir in red peppers and green olives and simmer for 5 minutes. Taste for seasoning. Stir in parsley for color.
Serve over yellow rice.
Yellow Rice
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 white onion, diced fine
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
½ teaspoon sea salt
1 pinch saffron
1 cup extra-long-grain rice
In a large saucepan, over medium-high heat, sauté the garlic and onion in the olive oil for 5 minutes until golden. Add the chicken broth, sea salt, saffron and rice. Bring to a boil and reduce heat to medium-low.
Cover with a tight-fitting lid and simmer for 15 minutes until the liquid is evaporated. Do not stir. Remove from the heat and let rest, covered for 5 minutes. Use a fork to fluff the grains and serve.
Serves 4
Victoria Allman is a columnist for Dockwalk, an international magazine for yacht crew and Marina Life Magazine. She has been a yacht chef for 12 years and traveled through the Caribbean, Europe, Asia, Africa, and the South Pacific gathering recipes and tales for her stories. Her first book, Sea Fare: A Chef's Journey Across the Ocean was released to critical acclaim and won the prestigious Florida Writers Association's Royal Palm Literary Award for Travel. To learn more, please visit: http://www.victoriaallman.com
Having a wedding theme means planning your wedding around something you love, your favorite color or maybe even the location of your wedding. Beach wedding centerpiece ideas can help to finish off your beach wedding theme.
Beach weddings allow you to be creative with the planning. In general, think nautical for ideas. All things related to the beach, sailing and the ocean fair game for centerpiece ideas.
Make sure your centerpieces fit in with the overall theme and color choices of your wedding and your reception location. Make note of colors at your reception location as well as the décor and use that as your starting point for all of your reception decoration planning.
Look online and in antique or vintage nautical stores for ideas and supplies. You would be surprised what you might find if you take a few days to stroll through a beach or harbor town.
If you are having a destination wedding, planning your centerpieces may be a little more challenging for you. Work with the wedding planner at your resort for ideas. They will be able to tell you what flowers and other items are available. They are also a valuable resource to bounce ideas off of and to lend a hand in pulling it all together.
Here are seven beach wedding centerpiece ideas:
Flowers
You can never go wrong with using flowers in your centerpieces. A beach wedding offers you the opportunity to include tropical flowers in your centerpieces, especially if you are getting married on an island.
For example, birds of paradise, orchids or hibiscus make great choices for a tropical wedding.
Candles
Look for unique candle shapes like bamboo, starfish, seashells or candles that look like coral. You can also buy votives and pillars that are decorated with shells, or you can create them yourself to save money.
Put them in a shallow vase or glass container filled with water, sand and shells. You can also use votive or floating candles in a similar way.
Fruit
Nothing says beach or tropical like fresh fruit. Fill vases with lemons, limes, mangos or any other tropical fruit. Accent it with fresh flowers or other nautical items.
Hurricane vases work really well. Try filling them with sand, shells or water as part of your centerpieces.
Unique Containers
Instead of a plain old vases try to find unique containers to hold your centerpieces. Ideas include lanterns, bamboo bowls
Sand Castles
This is a fun option that is perfect for a reception on the beach. Build them yourself with the help of friends, or hire someone to build them for you.
Lighthouses
Use them as centerpieces on their own or as containers for flowers. A unique twist is to have a different one on each table.
Nautical Items
Things like anchors, sail boats or a ship's bell can be used as centerpieces. One idea is to have a different vintage nautical item at the center of each table.
Stephen Badiali is the owner of Wedding Ideas Guide. For more ideas visit Beach Wedding Ideas.
Dogs are normally jolly, hyper, and may misbehave sometimes just like little kids. This is okay. But on other times, these happy and naughty moments turn into destructive behavior. That is why for some dog owners, having a dog gate is essential in maintaining a healthy and happy relationship with their beloved pets.
Broken telephone cables, electric chords, and broken vases? It is absolutely not a good scenario. We do not want our living room, bedroom, and other parts of the house to be turned unto our pet's playground. Not just because they create an illusion that our house was run over by a hurricane but broken things and appliances mean a lot of money-and it is a great deal of loss on our part.
That is why, in situations like this, dog owners like you wish to dog proof a room so a chewer dog would know his limitations around the house. There is no other perfect solution to this problem but a dog gate. A dog gate will help instill on our pet's mind his basic lessons of do's and don'ts. Plus he would eventually learn where the places he is and is not supposed to go; where he is allowed to fool around and where he is required to behave.
Well as compassionate owner, you might be worried about putting your pup behind a gate. Don't be... because you have to remember that you are supposed to set boundaries at times to establish that you are after all the boss. So to avoid him doing nasty things around his containment this time, you may provide him toys or treats to occupy his time with. Diverting his attention is the key. Just make sure he doesn't stay there all the time; nice afternoon walks or some morning jog are still necessary dog exercises for a healthy dog lifestyle.
Now, you probably are edged to purchase a dog gate from the market. But take a minute for a little yet important pointer; take note that there are two types of indoor dog gates: the pressure mounted gates and hardware mounted gates. How do they differ? Pressure mounted gates basically are best for smaller dogs; it has a latch that creates the pressure and it does not need any tools so it is very convenient to install. Aside from that, it is cheaper compared to the hardware mounted gate. This other type on the other hand is sturdier, can be screwed on its location and is advisable to use on top of the stairs.
Learn more about you can keep your dog out of trouble by limiting his access to specific rooms or areas by visiting dog gate.
