Hosting a BBQ Party
Thinking of hosting a get together in your backyard for some of your closest family and friends while you sip on some refreshments and gather around the grill? Awesome! Us too!
Hosting a party can be stressful, so we’ve created this list of things you should consider when planning your party to make sure it goes off without a hitch.
1. Don’t overbuy
In our house, it is super common for us to have more food on hand than we would ever need. As a matter of fact, we only recently finished the frozen burger patties my wife bought for Canada Day 2017 – a whole 11 months ago!
The easiest way to overcome this is to write out a menu of the food you plan to serve a couple of days before your party. If you only plan to keep it simple with burgers, sausages, and chicken wings; then only buy as much as you’re going to need to serve your guests.
2. Make sure you have enough fuel
There’s nothing worse than when you run out of charcoal or propane after your guests have arrived but before the food is cooked! Avoid this potential catastrophe by always having an extra bag of charcoal or an extra tank of propane on hand.
3. Give yourself enough time
Consider the food you plan to serve your guests and make sure you have enough time to cook your food to serve your guests, while still being able to enjoy yourself at the same time.
If there is a lot of prep work involved in getting the meal ready for the grill, do that ahead of time and keep it cold in the refrigerator until it’s time to cook.
If you’re planning on smoking a pork shoulder that is going to take 8 hours to cook, make sure you get up early enough to have it ready for when your guests arrive.
4. Serve everything buffet style
Reserve an area of your patio for your food with lots of napkins, paper plates, and plastic forks. Make it obvious that your guests can serve themselves and just keep the food coming!
5. Clean as you go
Let your guests help with the cleanup by placing a few garbage bins outside. That way when they’re done eating, they can just toss their plates and napkins into the waiting bin. Boom! One less thing to worry about.
6. Don’t forget some music
While you can spend hours planning the perfect playlist for the gathering, there’s nothing wrong with just breaking out the radio.
7. Finish strong with a grilled dessert
There are some great, simple ways to finish off your evening with dessert on the grill! You can experiment with fruit kabobs drizzled in honey, or you can try grilled banana boats – literally, just banana’s left in their peel and sliced lengthwise with chocolate chips/marshmallows/peanut butter added. Oh yes, it’s good.
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