Notes (and tips) from a dinner party

As much as I love cooking I'm not really interested in following complicated recipes. Who wants to be completely knackered before the evening begins? And besides, the best meals are those made with good quality ingredients that need little reworking. So I reckon the best dinner party tip is to shop for produce at fresh food markets and specialist delis. A little bit of investment at this end can save you time at the ‘business end’ because quality food will speak for itself.

A few more tips:

• Prepare as much as you can before the night. This is your main challenge. Get the housework out of the way early, or better yet delegate to other members of the household. And set the table the night before. How organised is that? 
• Try not to overfill your guests. Balance out a heavier dish with a lighter one and serve modest portions. You don’t want your dessert-making efforts to go to waste afterall. Nor do you want your over-stuffed guests falling asleep at the table. (Or is that just me?) 
• Make yourself a cup of coffee and write yourself a list of things to do, and the order in which they should be done. When estimating the time certain tasks will take you, double it and you should be safe. I always seem to forget that it will take five times as long to cut vegetables for ten people than it will for two.
• The list can also serve as a checklist in the final hectic moments. Man, the number of times I've opened the fridge the following day to see what I forgot to serve the night before! 
• This is no time for dieting. Think of the dinner as but one meal in the long narrative of your eating life. Encourage your guests to think the same way.   
• Having said that, embrace the dining guest with food requirements such as gluten-free or vegetarian. Think of them as a challenge to your creativity and rise to the occasion!
• Themes can be fun and can help inspire your menu planning. Visit this site for some ideas. How you interpret these themes is of course left entirely to your imagination.

Special occasion dinners call for a strong support cast of dining paraphernalia. I bought these candles from a market stall in Bangalow, NSW. I'm so in love with their indigo and midnight blue tones and their honeycomb texture I just want to eat them.

Vintage glasses with matching water pitchers I can't get enough of either. My mother used these tall glasses for serving parfaits in. She even had long-handled teaspoons to go with them.

Now I've appropriated them for sparkling wine. Come to think of it, the old-fashioned Marie Antoinette-style glasses that were once used for champagne are probably ideal for serving desserts in too.

You could also use vintage glasses as vases for individual flowers or small posies of fresh herbs, or for holding tealight candles.

Or! You could just use them for water. Flavour your drinking water with lemon and orange slices, and some freshly picked mint. Out for dinner at Colonel Tan's the other night, we were impressed by the strawberry, pineapple, mint and lemon-infused water that was sitting on the bar masquerading as plain old tap water.

And so to the napkins. A little fancy-folding always impresses in my books. Remember swans anyone? Don't worry, I'm not going there. Here's a simpler version:

Fold your square napkin into one large triangle like so.

Bring each of the top corners into the centre so you now have a square.

Turn over and then fold in half through the centre to make a small triangle (with the opening on the outside).

Then grab the two ends and prop the napkin up. Turn around and place on a plate. (Phew, I'm glad I can add photos - you would never have understood by those instructions.)