We moved! Just down the street (literally) but to a new neighborhood with new places to explore and a lot more space for hosting. Oh and did I mention we also have a backyard? I’m already envisioning dinner parties, move nights (yes, I may have bought a projector the week we moved in) and so many more memories to be made out there. While we are currently in our new building, we are temporarily living in another unit while we wait for our exact unit to become available in October. I’m slightly dying on the inside since I can’t decorate or set anything up. However, I know it will be well worth the wait as our unit has a big kitchen with lots of natural light that I can’t wait to get in and start cooking up a storm in!
We told ourselves we would only unpack the “essentials” while we wait to move into our unit. But we all know how that goes. Plus, my cake pans, pastry bags and sprinkles are definitely “essentials” that needed to be unpacked. Not to mention, our wine glasses and serving ware for dinner parties as I wasn’t about to hold back on hosting one right away.
It only took two weeks until I was ready to break this new space in with good food and great friends. And since Steve and I have been reminiscing on Italy a lot lately, as we’re dying to go back, it only seemed fitting to bring a little piece of Italy to Chicago.
For this dinner party, I really wanted to pull inspiration from when Steve and I were in Positano for our honeymoon. When I think back at the restaurants and dining scene, I think of all the colorful hand painted dishes and how the food really spoke for itself. Each dish was rich in flavor and bursting with fresh, herby/carby goodness. Lots of fresh vegetables and herbs, homemade pastas, olive oils, mozzarella and of course, really good wine. For the table setting, I decided to keep decor to a minimum to not take away from all the colors in the dishes. Plus, I did an instgram poll the other day for feedback of what you would like to see more of on here and it sounds like everyone loves some simple – quick and easy dinner party tips and ideas. Which is great as I do as well, being a girl-on-the-go but also as someone who is currently living out of boxes, this feedback was much appreciated. Thank you for saving me from digging through my many boxes for more stuff and for your feedback that will be the perfect excuse to throw more dinner parties!
The Table
For this table setting, these beautiful dishes from the “La Dolce Vita” Martha Stewart Collection at Macy’s really steal the show. So for the rest of the table to keep things simple, I added a faux greenery garland, a couple fresh lemons as lemons always make me think of Italy and a few white flowers to give the garland a little something extra. All dishes and garland have been linked in the scroll bars above and below.
The Food
Appetizers – Caprese Bites
Salad – Italian Panzanella
Main Course – Cacio e Pepe with Lemon
Dessert – Pistachio Cannoli Cake
Pair with your favorite Italian wines and if in a hurry, I love to order a pack from Martha Wine Co. where you can select a variety of Italian wines to be delivered to your door before the party.
This post was in partnership with Martha Stewart, some items in this post were c/o and some links are affiliated to help create (and give a budget) to my party throwing ideas!
I love this
Thanks Sylvain!