The Gourmet Host

We streamline the full hosting cycle, making dinner party planning easy, communal, and fun.

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

The backpacks are back by the door. Dinner's at six again, same as June. Someone asks how the first day went and actually waits for the answer this time.

https://t.co/i50mLlWkpp

#backtoschool #familydinner #weeknightdinner

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

A potluck falls apart when three people bring dessert and nobody brings a main. Run the sign-up in The Gourmet Host app and let everyone see what's covered.

https://t.co/TtmwKjEROG

#potluck #partyplanning #gettogether

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Mayo salads quit in the heat. Vinegar-based sides like coleslaw and pasta salad actually get better after a day in the fridge, and hold up all afternoon on a hot buffet.

https://t.co/6ljeRMDEnj

#bbqsides #potluck #foodsafety

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

The long weekend has no schedule. No start time, no end time. Dinner happens when people get hungry, and everyone stays later than they planned to.

https://t.co/Gg0RAZ6McQ

#longweekend #backyardparty #gettogether

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Ice in the cooler before the heat arrives. Chairs out of the garage. Grill wiped down. By sunset, the whole yard is ready for tomorrow's Labour Day guests.

https://t.co/I92CAQL8gz

#bbqparty #backyardparty #longweekend

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

A picnic menu planned the night before always beats one thrown together that morning. Build yours in The Gourmet Host app and actually enjoy the afternoon.

https://t.co/meJtrovTkl

#picnic #makeahead #summerentertaining

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Loose ice cubes lose. A solid block of ice, or a few frozen water bottles, holds its cold for hours longer and keeps your picnic cooler from going warm before dessert.

https://t.co/49ZoH8CFZP

#foodsafety #picnic #outdoorentertaining

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

You eat outside again tonight. Nobody reaches for a sweater. One more week of this, maybe two, so you stay at the table until the light finally goes.

https://t.co/Y0CTiKYq1X

#outdoordining #latesummer #alfresco

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

One more dinner on the grass before the season turns. Plates out while the sky goes amber, wine poured before the candles, a neighbor drawn over by the smell of the grill. This is the one worth clearing your evening for.

https://t.co/MKUbe8eqas

#outdoordining #alfresco #lastdaysofsummer

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Appetizers work on a clock, not a pile. Three stages.

Stage one goes out before the doorbell. Cold or room temperature only. Olives, nuts, cheese, something people can hold while they say hello.

Stage two lands about twenty minutes in, once the room is mostly full. This is the hot tray, straight from the oven, passed by hand rather than set down. One tray, one trip, everybody gets one.

Stage three is fifteen minutes before you sit. Something sharp and light, then clear the boards, because an empty surface moves people to the table.

Nothing new after that, or dinner competes with the snacks.

https://t.co/nSH9cI1Vt7

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#appetizers #dinnerparty #hostingtips

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Watch a platter go around a table. Someone holds it steady while their neighbour serves. A bottle travels without anyone asking. Hands cross.

Plated food arrives. Passed food happens.

That gap is wider than it sounds, because a dish moving hand to hand makes everyone briefly responsible for the person beside them. You cannot opt out of a platter.

The easiest way in is a roast. Bring it out whole, carve it at the table instead of in the kitchen, and let it travel from there.

https://t.co/0OAMIFRTVF

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#dinnerparty #familystyle #hosting

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Find out what people cannot eat while you can still do something about it.

Put the question in the invitation, right beside the RSVP. One line does it. Anything you don't eat, tell me by Friday and I'll plan around it.

Ask whether it is an allergy or a preference, because one is a kitchen safety rule and the other is a swap. Ask for the actual item too, not the label, since vegetarian covers a lot of ground and so does dairy free.

Give the same reply-by date as the RSVP so the answers arrive together. Then build one main everybody can eat, rather than one sad separate plate.

https://t.co/rMekLVj73R

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#dinnerparty #hostingtips #foodallergies

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Cooking a dish for the first time on the night guests arrive is how a calm afternoon becomes a rescue mission.

The recipe read as simple. Then it turned out to have four steps you had never done, and one of them needed a pan you do not own.

Start from food that already works. Recipes in The Gourmet Host mobile app give you hundreds of tested dishes to browse by course or by occasion, save what suits your table to your cookbook, and drop straight into the menu for the night.

https://t.co/Ey3wQqbgFE

Free on the App Store and Google Play.

#dinnerparty #recipes #hosting

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

The hour you spend the night before is worth three on the day.

And it is mostly not cooking. It is deciding. Set the table while the house is quiet. Clear a shelf in the fridge for whatever arrives. Pick where the coats go. Put the drinks in cold now, because nothing chills in twenty minutes.

The day of a dinner has no slack in it. Every decision you leave for four o'clock gets made in a hurry by someone who has not eaten.

Appetizers you can make the day before and forget about: https://t.co/ZF7dixtnWK

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#dinnerparty #hosting #makeahead

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

It started at one. It is somehow four thirty. Plates pushed back, a second pot of coffee, light that has moved all the way across the table.

Afternoons run long because they have no ending built in. No sunset cue, nothing anyone had to change clothes for. That is the whole trick, and it asks less of you than dinner does.

Two things protect it. Leave something out that people can keep picking at, and do not clear too early.

Clearing is a cue whether you meant it as one or not.

https://t.co/Q8PM2NOdHw

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#lunchwithfriends #hosting #entertainingathome

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Before you lay a single fork, decide how the food reaches the plate.

Plated means you serve from the kitchen. The middle of the table is yours for candles, and each place gets cutlery for every course, laid outside in.

Family style means platters in the middle. Keep that space clear, add trivets, put a serving spoon in every dish, and keep the decor low enough to see over.

Buffet means the food comes off the table entirely. Places carry cutlery, napkin and glass. Order the line as plates, mains, sides, sauces, then cutlery last so hands stay free.

Style first. The table follows.

https://t.co/GOILXA8olD

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#dinnerparty #tablesetting #hostingtips

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

The money part of a shared meal always happens afterwards. A spreadsheet on Sunday, a hunt for receipts nobody kept, and a total everybody rounds to a guess.

Tracking the cost while you shop beats reconstructing it three days later from memory.

The Gourmet Host mobile app keeps both halves together. Shop from one shared list, then split the total in Cost Sharing evenly by seat, by percentage, or with custom amounts when the even split is not the fair one.

https://t.co/1W70nKx9KF

Free on the App Store and Google Play.

#dinnerparty #hosting #potluck

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

Mismatched chairs are not a problem to solve.

Four from the dining set, two off the desk, the bench from the patio, the stool nobody claims. It looks like you borrowed from every room in the house, because you did.

A matched set says the table was always this size. A borrowed chair says somebody got added.

Put a cushion on the odd seat, then stop thinking about it. Nobody remembers what they sat on. They remember that there was room for them.

More ways to set a table outdoors, whatever you are working with: https://t.co/cozsseEtAQ

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#dinnerparty #tablesetting #outdoordining

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

The first knock always comes five minutes early. One guest on the step, holding flowers, or a bottle, or a tin of something they made that morning.

The gift is never the tricky part. Handling it is.

A bouquet that sends you hunting for scissors and a vase takes you out of the room for the first ten minutes of your own party, and your guest gets to watch you do it.

So put a vase of water out before anyone arrives. Then say thank you, name the thing, set it down, and get back to the door.

https://t.co/HEUJ4SYVtZ

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#dinnerparty #hosting #hostessgift

[The Gourmet Host @TheGourmetHost]

The knife that cuts you is the dull one. Hone weekly, sharpen yearly.

Honing straightens an edge that has rolled over. Sharpening grinds a new one. They are different jobs and most people only ever do the first.

So hone before any big cook. Steel tip down on the board, blade at roughly 20 degrees, light pressure, five strokes a side, heel to tip. Sharpen once or twice a year, on a whetstone or by someone who does it properly.

Test it on paper. Hold a sheet up and slice down. Sharp glides. Dull skids and tears.

Then protect the edge. Hand wash, dry it right away, never the dishwasher, and store it on a magnet or in a block, not loose in a drawer.

https://t.co/TqYByWPlJy

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#knifeskills #kitchentips #hostingtips