Hosting a Couples' Supper Club ... Chinese Take-Out Style

We have a small group of friends that has started getting together monthly for a supper club. This past Friday night, it was our turn to host (and shockingly, it was our first time of even attending this months-old gathering ... we were out of town all of the other weekends when it was held!).

Friday nights for me and Ian are always pretty low-key. He's just come off of a long work week and is ready for some R&R, and these days with being a big ol' pregnant lady chasing around a spunky toddler, I'm all about relaxed Fridays as well. My friend Sarah recently heard of a friend who relied heavily on Chinese take-out for her supper club, so I completely swiped that idea and ran with it!

I didn't do any wild decorating, but I did have some old paper lanterns from Pottery Barn that I whipped out for the occasion. One hung from our light fixture with a homemade tassel at the base, and the other was propped on a large candlestick on a card table and finished off with chopsticks on top. 

I also had some old Chinese tea tins that I picked up in Chinatown while on a NYC trip several years back. We had these on the tables at our wedding reception, so it was fun to use them again!

We ate out of cardboard takeout boxes that I picked up at Michaels which was a) CUTE and b) DISPOSABLE! It was so wonderful to end the evening just cleaning off the serving dishes and not having to also wash ten dinner plates.

For the meal to feed 10 people, here's what I did:

- Classic Annie's Asian Appetizer dip ... always a hit, not a bit left over! (recipe HERE) served with wasabi rice crackers

- 2 orders takeout Orange Chicken

- 2 orders takeout Basil Beef

- 1 order takeout Shrimp with Broccoli

- White rice, brown rice, fried rice

- Veggie eggrolls from Trader Joe's

- Dessert was a green tea mochi ice cream ball from Trader Joe's and a fortune cookie

All in all, it cost probably $75 (outside of the wine, Perrier, and beer we had for everyone) and while that is pricey, $7.50 a person for Supper Club is pretty darn good! I know that may be odd to share the cost, and I'm not trying to be tacky or gauche, but I think people like to read about those kind of things and see that it is perfectly possible to host a dinner party for 10 without breaking the bank (or your back ... takeout was an AWESOME choice!). The takeout boxes were around $10 and I had another $10 in flowers from Trader Joe's. 

So, although it was definitely not a magazine-worthy affair, not a single person left hungry -- or thirsty! :)