Birthday Celebration

Source of Picture: CocoNeenies from Etsy.com

Yesterday was my friend Amy's birthday so we organized a small group dinner outing for 6 at Agave ( http://www.agaverestaurant.com/ ), one of my favorite restaurants in Atlanta.

If you like Southwestern food, you must give Agave a try. They also have a wonderful Chef's menu for $30 per person if you have at least a group of 6. With this menu, there will be 9 items that will be served family style, including 3 appetizers, 3 entrees, 2 sides, and a dessert platter. I think it can be a great place to host a rehearsal dinner if you prefer something different.

We decided to order off the menu last night and it was just as great. I think the Diablo Crawfish Pasta with a spicy chile cream sauce that my friend Cindy ordered last night was becoming my new favorite (she was nice enough to let me have a taste of her dish) although my Beer Braised Pork Shank was quite tasty too.

After dinner, I brought cupcakes for the group to celebrate with Amy. To make it a special treat, I ordered cupcake picks from http://www.etsy.com/shop/coconeenies

You will see the cupcake picks that I bought from CocoNeenies pictured above. I was able to customize the cupcake picks with Amy's name. I then brought the cupcake picks to the bakery and handpicked each cupcake to match the color of the cupcake picks. Obviously, if you are doing this for a wedding, you can work with your bakery to make sure you have a cake that matches your color scheme and still tastes good!

Corrie who is the owner of CocoNeenies is based in Atlanta and her work was definitely high quality. She also ships her products very fast. If you go to her Etsy site, you will see some other paper goods as well besides cupcake picks. I highly recommend contacting Corrie if you want something custom made for your party!

Home Entertaining Tips

Last night I had two friends over for dinner but I always wanted to do something special for my guests even if it is just a casul get together.

For me, having a nice table setting really creates the atmostphere before the guests even eat their first bite of food. Since we are serving simple home made pizza and fish stew, I tried to set the table to be casual and fun. I also chose a bold color for summer. The flowers were picked up from Kroger and it is their weekly special and I put them in the square vase that I have at home to make the simple centerpiece. I then lighted a few candles around the table right before my friends arrived to complete the look.

In the second picture above, you will notice a few cupcakes which were served as desserts. While my wonderful husband made the delicious pizza and fish stew (all from his own recipe nonetheless!) , neither one of us is really a baker, so I picked up the cupcakes from CEO Custom Cakes, LLC. ( http://www.ceocustomcakes.com/ ) earlier in the day. I simply put the cupcakes on colorful expresso cup saucers to present it and it was a hit!

My philosophy is if you are not the expert and you know someone else is, why spend hours trying to make it happen yourself? Courtney Olivari from CEO Custom Cakes, LLC. did the wonderful work for me on the cupcakes and I just have to present it to my guests.

I am also a big fan of serving something simple but delicious for home parties. If it requires extensive hours in the kitchen, I believe it is easier to entertain outside and let the chefs cook because I do believe as a host, you want to still have energy to talk to your guests when they arrive.

Planning ahead is also a key. My husband actually cut the vegetables the night before so that it can be quickly cooked yesterday. Think of recipes that can be premade or prefreeze but cooked on the day of event and you will be less likely to feel stressed out when the clock is ticking and you are still trying to finish your prep work.

My final tip for home entertainment: be ready before the guests arrive. Take a shower and change your clothes. Sit down on the couch and enjoy the atmosphere that you just created and enjoyed it before your guests come. Close your eyes and smell the food. You are about to have a great party and you know it!

Inspiration from the Farmer's Market

Last weekend I stopped by at the Sandy Springs Farmers Market before lunch. Little did I know there are quite a few vendors who provided inspirations for me in event planning.

(1) http://www.crepemasters.com

Crepe Masters told us that they can prepare their crepes on location. We asked them if they will have a long line because I hate waiting in line for my food at an event. They said depending on the number of guests, they can send more chefs to ensure that the orders can be done fast.

Instead of serving the same old food at your event, why not try something different? Perhaps you can have the crepes as the dessert option instead of a cake?

(2) http://www.emilygs.com

Emily G's Jam of Love caught our attention with its mouth watering samples of all the different jams at their booth. For brides who are looking for something local as favors or to put in the out-of-town bags for their guests, Emily G's put their jams in a 4oz jar and they are definitely very cute (not to mention that they taste great!). I don't know if it is a coincidence that they named it "Jam of Love" but it seems like that only makes it even more appropriate as a wedding favor!

Go check out your local farmer's market. You may be pleasantly surprised!

Food, Glorious Food!

I was in a class this Wednesday when the topic of food came up as it relates to event planning. The instructor asked everyone to share their memorable events and whether food was involved in creating that memory.

Most people shared the horror stories of events that involved food and very few people shared a memorable event that involved good food. If it is so easy for people to remember bad food experience at an event, what can we do to prevent that?

Some suggestions that I thought are helpful for event planning:

(1) Walk the buffet line to make sure it works prior to the event.

Instead of relying on the description of the venue/catering personnel, it is best that you physically walk the buffet line to ensure that it will indeed flow well for the guests.

For example, is it really possible to get the total number of guests through the buffet line in the amount of time you have set aside for the dining portion of your event?

Hungry guests are not going to be happy to wait in line and it takes careful planning to minimize the wait time in the buffet line.

(2) Have a variety of food and drinks available for your guests

Sometimes it is easy for people to forget about the special needs of their guests if they do not have any food allergy problem or diet restriction themselves.

Will the vegetarians in your guest list have a “real” vegetarian option on the menu or just the rabbit food type of salads?

What about those who maybe allergic to nuts? If your menu items have “hidden” nuts that are not visible to your guests, they might get very sick very soon.

If people do not drink alcohol, what options do they have in terms of drinks?

In general, try to have a wide variety of food and drinks available at an event to help most people find what they like.

(3) Do not lie about your headcount to the caterer

Most caterers will prepare more food to account for extra people who show up for your event but please do not lie about your headcount to your caterer in order to save money.

To run out of food before everyone has a chance to eat definitely ranks high among event disasters.

If a lot of unexpected guests do show up and you know the food is not enough, it might be helpful to ask your caterer to serve the food in portions so that the people who are first in lines do not take more than they need.

Do you have other tips that you would like to share?

Site Visits

Last weekend I did two site visits, one with a couple whom I am working with and the other was for a venue open house.

Site visit is very important because it lets you know first hand how you feel once you are in the venue. No matter what the pictures show, you want to look at it because pictures can be deceiving. Besides, you can talk to the people who will be handling your event and see how they are in person.

The first venue we visited was actually set up for a wedding reception that night. It was definitely very helpful for the couple who was considering hosting their wedding reception there to see how the banquet set up really is at this place. I could tell that they love it from their eyes. Later on, they told me that they both really love the room the minute they entered it.

The second venue was having an open house and I went there just to take a look because of the great packages offered by the venue. I wanted to know if it is a place that could be recommended to brides in the future.

While the food tasting at the open house was quite good, I was not really impressed with the bare room. I felt that it is definitely more suitable for a regular party instead of hosting wedding receptions. I could not really made this decision if I had not been in this venue in person because it was not easy to tell the real atmostphere from the pictures that the venue posted online.

Another reason for site visit is so that you can imagine how your event will flow in the space. While some venues will post their floor plan online, the only way you can access the logistics to host your event there is to look at the space itself. You may even get a few ideas once you take a look.

Personally, I love doing site visits. It gives me ideas on what kind of event can take place in that space so the next time someone asks me for recommendations, it will come very easily.