A Dinner Party to Inspire Wanderlust

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From tiramisu to tacos al pastor, we had everything covered.

The first time I helped host an “around the world” theme party was in college. We were in our senior year and living in a set of gorgeous new apartments on campus. The idea came out of girls’ wine night, and, the next thing we knew, we had more than a dozen of our friends’ apartments signed up to be a part of the party! It was an absolute blast.

This past New Year’s, we decided to host an adult version and it did not disappoint at all.

Since every dish was inspired by our friends’ travels, we had built-in conversation starters. We all love traveling and it was so much to hear about favorite restaurants and spots in different places around the world – and hatch a few upcoming trips of our own.

Buffet style is the way to go for this dinner party. A few sources I’m able to find and link: salad plates; black tablecloth; black sparkly tablecloth overlay

Here are a few tips that came out of our party to help you plan your own:

  1. Make it potluck and have everyone decide what dish they’re going to bring. We encouraged everyone to pick a country based on where they’ve been, where they were going, or where they’d love to go.
  2. Organize over email. Everyone brainstormed and selected their countries and dishes over email. It was perfect and helped ensure that we didn’t end up with all carbs and no veggies, or all Italian food. We ended up with quite a mix of dishes covering everywhere from South Africa to Spain.
  3. Supply something neutral as the beverage for the night. Since it was New Year’s Eve, we opted for bubbles. Champagne and sparkling wine is always a good option no matter what season you’re in in my book, but it’s especially good when you have a bunch of competing flavors and spices. This was something we missed in college when everyone paired their dishes with drinks. Think going from an Irish Car Bomb to Sake to a White Russian.
  4. Go for disposable. It’s one of the few times I’ll say it, friends, but since we had so many different dishes and a good-sized crowd, we opted for plastic. It was still chic plastic as my friend, Chloe, found these fabulous disposable glitter champagne flutes on Amazon.
  5. Have fun with the decorations. We used our New Year’s tabletop as the backdrop, but you can go crazy with different flags on toothpicks for every country, brilliant colors for the backdrop, and a fun banner. I’d keep cocktail napkins and dessert plates or salad plates a neutral color, like gold, to ground the rest of the busy prints.
  6. Opt for buffet style. It’s so much easier, especially if you have a crowd coming. You won’t have to worry about timing and you won’t be limited to the number of friends you can fit around your dinner table.
  7. Provide the appetizers. Since nearly everyone was focused on their main dishes for the dinner, we pulled together a few appetizers for friends to munch on as they arrived. Inevitably, things needed to be warmed up, scooped into different serving dishes, and placed on the table, so having some bites (and beverages, of course) already set out keeps everyone happy.

A special thanks for my fabulous friends for helping with this post!

We scattered chocolate coins on the table since it was New Year’s Eve – wishing everyone good health and prosperity in the New Year.
You can find the details of our New Year’s tabletop here. Candlesticks are here.