Recipes For A Dinner Party Of 8

Serve it with rice (here's how you make rice without a rice cooker) and maybe have one of your guests bring over some crusty bread, too. Recipe here.

There are two parts of this recipe that might make you nervous and I'm going to explain to you why NOTHING ABOUT THIS RECIPE SHOULD MAKE YOU NERVOUS.

1) Maybe you've never bought lamb shanks before. Don't worry, most butchers have them, and they're happy to cut and trim them for you.

Dinner Party Recipes

2) You need to brown the meat before you put it in the crockpot. This should not scare you. Get a skillet really, REALLY hot, then put the lamb shanks in and turn them a couple of times so that they're browned on ever side. And honestly, if you over- or under-brown, it's not a big deal.

First, heat a skillet and brown the outside of the pork loin on the stove top. Then, stick the whole skillet in the oven to finish cooking the meat. To complete the meal, these garlic roasted potatoes are great, and you can cook them at the same time as you cook the pork, since both call for a 400°F oven. This simple green salad would be good on the side, too. Pork loin recipe here.

Buying a super-flavorful sausage like chorizo takes no extra effort, but makes an otherwise easy and simple dish dinner party-worthy. Recipe here.

Easy Dinner Party Ideas (+recipes)

Red curry paste, which is sold in the ethnic aisle of most standard grocery stores, adds a ton of complex flavor to an otherwise simple dish. If you can't find Chinese spinach, sub regular spinach or mustard greens. Serve over rice or rice noodles for an impressive but quick (20 minutes, start to finish!) dinner party dish. Recipe here.

Jamie Oliver tells you to baste with the cooking juices when you remember, because even if you forget, the end result will be delicious. To serve, no need to carve (which really isn't that hard but I get it, it's intimidating), just let the chicken cool a little, pull it off the bone, and serve it on plates on top of mashed potatoes, drizzled with the delicious sauce that's creating in the pot with the chicken as it cooks. Recipe here.

This impressive-looking dish is almost stupidly simple: Remove kale leaves from the stem, slice potatoes, cut chicken legs in half, throw everything together in a pan with oil and seasoning, and roast. If separating the chicken thigh from the drumstick sounds intimidating, just buy 8 chicken drumsticks and 8 chicken thighs. Recipe here.

Unique Dinner Party Themes And Ideas I Paperless Post

This easy stew is so pretty and so hearty that all you need to serve it with is tortilla chips! The recipe is for 6, but if you have a big (at least 6 quart) pot, you can double it and freeze the leftovers. Recipe here.

The best part of beef stew is that it pairs well with both red wine and bourbon, the two greatest things about staying in when it's cold outside. Recipe here.

Enchiladas can be easy to make, but this enchilada casserole is even easier. And face it, everything falls apart on the plate anyway. Recipe here.

Show Stopping Main Recipes For Your Next Dinner Party

You need to plan ahead, since this one takes 12-24 hours to marinate and 7 hours to cook. But other than that, all you need to do is mix ketchup and soup mix, smother it on brisket, put it in the fridge, take it out of the fridge, put it in the oven, and take it out of the oven. Sandwiches are a good idea, I think, but if that's too lowbrow for you, you can serve this with potatoes. Recipe here.

Sometimes you just want to have a bunch of people over, and you just want to feed them something delicious. This recipe serves 4, but you can easily double it to serve 8. Recipe here.We love hosting our friends and family for dinner parties—truly, there’s nothing better than seeing our loved ones gathered around our table. But we don’t necessarily love the stress that goes along with it (planning menus, shopping for ingredients, spending the whole day cooking) or the last-minute frazzle to get everything done when we’d really rather be hanging out with our guests. But over the years, we’ve mastered our technique. The secret to our success? Crowd-pleasing dishes that look super impressive but are actually so simple to pull off (think: jambalaya, Italian bruschetta bar, an easy one-pan ratatouille, and more). Here are 27 of our favorite easy time dinner party recipes.

Like it took all day but really took 30-ish minutes. The secret to this one is that it all cooks together in one pan. (Bonus: You won’t be left with a pile of dirty cookware when all the guests go home.)

No Cook Recipes For Your Next Summer Dinner Party

This elegant DIY bruschetta bar looks like it came from a fancy caterer. But really, it’s just a matter of buying the right essentials and a little artful arrangement.

Gaby Dalkin’s smoky, citrusy grilled salmon recipe is our go-to for any warm-weather holiday. Serve it with a crisp white wine and never look back.

A slow cooker can be a total dinner-party savior; doing all the heavy lifting earlier in the day means more time to hang out with your guests. This restaurant-worthy dish pairs fork-tender braised beef and al dente pasta. (And don’t forget the dollop of ricotta on top.)

Cheap Dinner Party Ideas

Jambalaya is fun, festive and one of our favorite ways to feed a crowd (it’s really just a one-pan rice dish). Crank up the jazz and serve it with a pitcher of daiquiris for a real New Orleans vibe.

If a cartoon rodent can make this dish look fancy, so can you. Plus, it’s totally vegan and gluten-free, so it’s a great thing to serve when you’re not totally up on what your guests prefer.

How to make a salad look impressive? Turns out, all you need to do is serve it on a board instead of in a bowl. This one, full of ripe figs and ribbons of prosciutto, is a first-course knockout.

Holy Moly! Top 50 Dinner Party Main Dish Recipes Volume 8: The Best Dinner Party Main Dish Cookbook On Earth: S. Jordan, Ida: 9798512703854: Amazon.com: Books

There’s nothing better for a summer gathering than a good old-fashioned shrimp boil with sausage, corn and plenty of Old Bay seasoning. In this easy dinner party recipe, everything cooks together in a Crock-Pot, so all you need to do when friends arrive is slice up some good crusty bread.

Is there anything more inviting than the smell of a chicken roasting? Also, it really couldn’t be easier. Throw some veggies onto the pan or toss a salad and dinner is done.

This classic Moroccan dish is usually made in a traditional clay pot with a cone-shaped top that lets out the steam. But a regular skillet will work too. Sub in whatever veggies you have on hand, but don’t skimp on all the warming spices (you’ll never look at cinnamon the same way again).

Dinner Party Ideas That Make Dinner The Show

OK, so we know this is not how Julia Child did things. But the slow cooker is actually a great way to get the beef melt-in-your-mouth tender. (Plus, you’ll actually have time to make dessert, and we know she’d approve of that.)

We love a taco party with friends, especially when the options are a little more exciting than you might make on a random Tuesday. This cochinita pibil—savory, citrusy pork shoulder—definitely fits the bill, and you can whip it up easily in a slow cooker or Instant Pot. We won’t tell if you don’t.

Bouillabaisse is a notoriously complex dish that can take several hours (and several trips to the fish market). But paring down the ingredients a bit turns it into a totally manageable (and totally delicious) one-pot meal that’s perfect for a dinner party.

Fall Dinner Party Ideas For Menus That Wow

Scallops are fabulous for a last-minute dinner party when you haven’t had time to plan or prep ahead of time. They’re pretty foolproof (really, all you need is a hot pan) and come together in minutes.

Sometimes the best way to throw a dinner party is to keep things as simple as possible. Good steaks, a bright herby sauce and plenty of good wine? We promise you’ll have happy guests.

Lasagna will always be one of our favorite ways to feed a crowd—all the work is done ahead of time, it feeds a million people and everyone loves it. We love this extra-flavorful recipe, which has a hearty meat sauce and pesto-packed ricotta filling.

Make Ahead Recipes To Eat For Dinner Tonight

We love all the different tastes and textures in this one-pan meal: crispy chicken thighs, salty feta and a spicy, creamy yogurt sauce drizzled on top. Arrange it all on your most elegant platter and congratulate yourself on a hosting job well done.

Just like grandma used to make (except with almond flour instead of the regular stuff, making it a great choice for guests following a paleo or Whole30 diet).

This healthy side is packed full of flavor and is basically the perfect accompaniment to whatever your dinner party main might be (although we love it with chicken).

Easy Dinner Party Ideas

Curry sauce, broccoli and chicken are topped with pomegranate seeds and cashews, and served over cauliflower rice—this is sure to add some zing to your dining room table.

Hot pot is the greatest and easiest dinner party