Easy Entertaining: A Dessert Buffet

Buying Supplies for Your Dessert Buffet

Aim for these quantities if you would like to send guests home with leftover pastries:
 
 For eight people: 80 pastries, 4 bottles of wine, 2 pots of coffee
 For 16 people: 160 pastries, 8 bottles of wine, 3 pots of coffee
 For 24 people: 240 pastries, 12 bottles of wine, 5 pots of coffee
 
Keep in mind that it’s entirely acceptable to set out a mishmash of dishes, alternating styles as you stack them. If you don’t own 36 crystal flutes or silver for 24, borrow from friends, use disposables, or call a party-rental company (look in the Yellow Pages under categories such as “Party Equipment and Supplies”). Most deliver the day before the event, pick up the day after, and―bless them―require only that you scrape, not wash, the dishes.
Prices vary according to glitz. For a standard dessert plate, fork, and Champagne flute, expect to pay about $1.50 a person. Delivery fees start around $40; a minimum order is sometimes required. The cost increases with the number of guests―but so does the benefit of having someone else do the dishes.
 
Set up the buffet table―minus the pastries and beverages―the night before. Before setting out your dessert spread, keep these table tips in mind.
 
 

• If you have a cake stand, use it. The height will add visual impact to the table and will offer a bit of extra space on the crowded buffet table.
• Place a couple of small platters or plates of assorted pastries around the room on a coffee table or a mantel.
• Set out dishes of your favorite chocolates or chocolate-covered nuts.
• Place the plates at the far end of the table, the food in the middle, and the beverages, cutlery, and napkins at the other end so guests are free to reach for the pastries.
• You can never have too many cocktail napkins, both on the buffet and on end tables.
• Once the party starts, maintain! When a tray empties, refill it or remove it.

Beverage Basics

There’s no need to offer a full bar, regular and decaffeinated coffee, three kinds of tea, and sparkling as well as still water. If you don’t know your guests’ preferences, stick with a single sparkling wine (wine expert Andrea Robinson suggests a sweet sparkling wine, such as Giorgio Rivetti La Spinetta Moscato d’Asti), decaffeinated coffee, and still water. (And, if you’d like, some hot water for tea. Rather than brewing a pot, consider offering tea bags.) After you make the first pot of coffee or hot water, set up a second run so it will be ready when you need it.