A 1980s dinner party and do people still have them?

[Comedycook]

So I was reminiscing with my sister earlier.

Growing up in the 80s, our parents would host "proper" dinner parties.

The table would be set, prior to dinner, drinks and nibbles would be provided in the living room, a three course dinner would be served in the dining room, then afterwards more drinks would be served in the living room...brandies and whisky I presume.

The men would wear suits, children would be sent to bed or left with babysitters.

Do people still do this nowadays? When we get together with friends now, the whole evening is so informal in comparison. My parents dinner parties seem very grown up in comparison!

So just wondering if people still have "proper" dinner parties? Is it just very posh people or is it stuck firmly in the past?!

This thread has taken me back to the dinner parties my parents used to host in the 80s. My DM wrote the menu she had planned on a chalkboard in the kitchen - I seem to remember she always made chicken liver pate and melba toast as the starter! We children were allowed to come in and say hello to the guests (usually in our dressing gowns and slippers), and then went off to bed. I longed to be allowed to stay - it all seemed very adult and glamorous. DM always smelled of Youth Dew and had her hair done.

Prosecco and nipples when they arrive.

Excellent! Sounds much more fun than angels on horseback.

Where do you put the keys?

A certain sort of eating – both eating out and at home with friends — was very formal up until the mid/late 1980s. High-end restaurants in London, for example, used to insist on jacket and tie for men and formalwear not too far short of evening dresses for women.

I think this is where the formal dinner party culture came from; people were replicating at home what they did in the restaurants they liked.

Now it's a lot more informal, again led by restaurant culture. This is why chef-restauranteurs like Gary Rhodes and Gordon Ramsay (and, latterly, Jamie Oliver) were so influential in the 90s; they casualised the 'look' of formal dining while at the same time prioritising food quality and provenance. It deprioritised the maître d aspect of eating out, and brought consumer and chef/food closer together. You could have a Michelin star dinner without having to put a penguin suit on. This trickled through into dinner party culture. I haven't been asked to put on formalwear for a dinner party in at least 20 years.

I think Nigella Lawson was massively influential here, too. Especially with How To Eat. It brought the casual 'kitchen sups' eating style of the upper and upper-middle classes to the mainstream and presented food as to be enjoyed, rather than to be bowed and scraped around. The fact that she wrote so well about food (still does) only helped.

I don't think there are any Michelin star/chef restaurants in London that still insist on jacket and tie now. A few in New York still do it, but not many. Good riddance; it's stuffy, quaint and stuck in the past.

When I hear the phrase dinner party, I just have images of Uncle Albert mixing up the gravy jar with the coffee jar...

Not if you have a surgeon living across the road who butchers deer in his spare time.

I still buy a bottle each time I’m in the UK by way of having a wee wander down memory lane.

We host dinners for friends pretty regularly & also get invited to theirs.
No suits or formal wear but we do dress nicely.
We usually have 6 or 8 guests but have hosted up to 12 or 14 too.
It always starts with a cocktail & nibbles as people arrive. We might then move onto champagne or cava.
Then we sit down & we always serve at least 3 courses but often more.
Starters.could be seafood pasta, or fennel & prawn risotto, or goats cheese & caramelised onion tarts etc
I always make a main that can be prepped ahead so things like Italian chicken served with rosemary & garlic potatoes.& salad, or beef bourguignon served with mash & lemon & herb greens etc
Big bowls of salad and or veg all in the middle of the table..two lots of each depending on how many guests
Cheesboard with chutneys, fruit & crackers
Dessert- I often make 2 or 3 depending on numbers.
Tea / coffee/ liquer coffees
Good red & white wine throughout the meal
Maybe a g&t after
They're a lot of work but i really love them
And I also love going round to friends houses where they make similar efforts
We're all in our 50s & usually disgracefully drunk by the end of an evening

I raise you the 70s dinner party. My mum's lemon cheesecake, avocado PEARS, orange vinyl tile effect wallpaper, hostess trolley and my mum in a kaftan.

I have female friends round a fair bit. It's informal but fancy if that makes sense.

I tend to do a theme - so afternoon tea, Mexican, tapas, Indian etc. we tend to really dress up and prance about. For Mexican night there was a pantomime horse because I had one in the spare room. As you do.

Multiple courses and loads of dishes. Including petit fours! I'm a good cook and a thoroughly enjoy cooking, especially as philistine DD likes to live on xxx and chips.

We are all mid 40s and quite frankly cba getting dressed up to go out so we go a bit crazy knowing we can stick a pair of slippers on at any point.

I might do pie night next. Dress code onesies. Pies, fancy as fuck.

Used to have friends over for dinner as eating out at a restaurant only happened on special occasions like a birthday. Drinks and crisps/nuts in sitting room then three-course meal in the dining room (later in eat-in kitchen) followed by coffee and mints.

Nowadays it's just the family with grandkids and an easy meal like lasagne and a nice desert. No fuss!

PS there was always wine available and some of our posher friends served champagne before dinner. No suits were worn by men but usually a shirt and tie with smart trousers. Women wore smart-casual even back then.

That's absolutely the first thing I think of when I hear the words "Dinner Party '!

Don’t forget the Mateus Rose.

Trouble is pavlova leaves so many crumbs doesn’t it?

I got the impression that when they did go out to dinner in a restaurant, one person or couple had invited the other out and was hosting. When I was a child you told the chap (and it usually was a chap) who had invited you out what you wanted, not the waiter. Now that everyone is in the habit of sharing the bill it’s much easier to suggest going out for dinner. I’m sure my parents were throwing dinner parties as a substitute for paying massive restaurant bills.

There was a lot of this when I was growing up, and I was surprised my friends didn't have dinner parties. I held a few, but have only been to one. Once we had DC it was easier for women only to have dinner parties, and the DH would hide on another room. My parents would find this really strange. It's more usual for several couples to go out to a restaurant or have a BBQ.

Maybe I should have a dinner party soon. My parents always served sherry before a meal. I Wonder what my friends would think if I offered them sherry?

@UniBallEye a woman after my own heart. That sounds so good 😋

It's not something I ever remember my parents doing. I get the feeling it was reserved for the middle classes.

BBQs, take-aways and eating out seem to be the more modern style.

UniBallEye

Your dinner party’s sounds about how mine go, I think it’s much easier for us to do as we are In our 50’s and early 60 , and don’t have little kids at home. Also probably like me money is not really a issue. I love the night I host and love also that we get invited to our friends houses a lot.
We probably have just a good social life as we did in our early twenty’s before we had kids.

We used to do dinner parties (formal or informal) and big summer, Christmas and new year parties, but I have become much less sociable since covid.

@Nanalisa60 @BloodyHellKen
Glad to see I'm.not alone!
The funny thing is my parents never ever entertained at home & my mum is not a good cook.
It's something I just love doing & always have since I was in my 20s
We're early 50s & have as good a social life now as we did before kids !

I think easily accessible and more affordable restaurants; smaller homes/ apartment living; two working parents being the norm (so less time); children being less seen but not heard and more integral parts of the family - all these things mean that for us we get a babysitter and meet friends to eat out. It maximizes actual adult interaction, doesn’t require a tonne of effort, allows us to try new places etc. We do “entertain” on high days and holidays, but it’s all planned well in advance and is a bit of a palaver.

I quite fancy some gammon with Cumberland sauce myself...

Yes we do this occasionally, two other couples on our street that we get together with two or three times a year - we take it in turns to host, but no children involved. We all like cooking and eating so we make an effort, always start off with fizz and nibbles, and there will be pudding and cheese. DP and I often have friends to supper, most often just one couple but sometimes there'll be six of us; rarely more than that as we're poor old things and get too tired! But again it would be 3 - 4 courses and something a bit fancier than usual. I don't call it a dinner party tho.

I'll do a lunch instead. A bit of bubbles, a quiche with roasted potatoes, berries and cake with coffee or cafe lattes. Less pressure somehow.