The Last Word/Chris Cosentino

What do you think is the key ingredient to hosting/throwing a successful party?

Not setting such high expectations for yourself and enjoying the experience.

Describe your worst party disaster.

Cooking a full meal featuring wonderful meat, only to find out my guest’s date was a vegetarian.

What do you like most/least about entertaining?

Most: the fun and conversation over food.

Least: the clean up is always a bummer.

If you had one piece of advice for a novice entertainer, what would it be?

Be prepared in advance so you can spend time with your guests.

Name three trends you see evolving in home entertaining:

• Getting your guests involved in the cooking.
• Serving family style, which gets guests who don’t know each other that well to have conversations.
• Pot luck dinners with a theme around a particular country, where each person brings a dish from that country, and then tells a story about it so everyone learns something new.