Hosting a Dinner Party

Hosting a Dinner Party – October 18, 11

So, a couple of Saturdays ago I hosted a dinner party at our house.   Now, I am not going to write that it is the cheapest thing to host but there are some ways to keep costs lower.  Here is what I did.

The weekend before the party was Thanksgiving and even though I did not have the menu, etc planned at that time there were certain things that I knew I would need for the party regardless and they were on sale for Thanksgiving.  This was items like sparkling grape juice, pop and juices to make punch, and fancy pickles and olives.

When I planned the party it was a fall themed party so accordingly the menu followed suit.  This helped me save costs by being able to purchase some in season menu items.   I planned a boneless skinless chicken breast main course.  Expensive, yes, but less expensive that some other cuts of meat.

Also, when I went shopping for the menu items I wrote a list of the items that I would need to buy and on certain of the specialty items I put quantities.  This helped me to buy the exact amount needed for the dish.

The best thing about a dinner party, of course, is the leftover food.  YUM. YUM.  Of course, that saves money as why would you want to eat out when you have this fancy, yummy food sitting at home that only needs to be reheated?

Wood Stove

Our house has natural gas heat as well as a wood stove.  We enjoy the wood heat very much and in the winter there are few things better than sitting in front of the nice warm heat on a cold day. 

It's not winter yet, only fall.  Let's not rush things here!  The reason for this post is that these days it is around 10'C so not to cold but definitely a chill in the air.  Now we could just turn our furnace up and have it come on occasionally but we have the wood stove.  So, we take advantage of the “free” heat and keep our house as warm as we want too!

However, there are other ways to take advantage of the wood heat.   You may tell me it's heating my house, saving me money on my heat bills; isn't that enough?  Maybe for you but I think there is at least a couple of other ways to take advantage of that heat.

The first is dry your clothes with it.  It's pretty cheap to buy a clothes rack or an indoor clothes line and put it up right next to your wood stove.  It's going to save you money in the long run and if you are like me you are used to hanging your clothes to dry on the line in the summer anyway.  The best part, no clothespins.

The second way is to cook your meals on it.  WHAT?!?!? Now I am not talking all your meals or anything like that, unless, of course, you want too.  However, in the winter with company we will often hang out in the wood stove room (downstairs in our house) as it is very warm there.  So, I bring my kettle down and heat up the tea there.  It's just as easy and we aren't in a hurry.   Also, if you are making turkey soup, chili or something else like that that has to sit on the stove for a long time on low heat and needs to be checked on every now and then.  You can do it on your wood stove.  You have to add fuel to your wood stove anyway every now and then so just check/stir your food while you are at it.