Timing and pace

Pace is the difference between a dinner that feels generous and one that feels either rushed or endless. Twenty to twenty five minutes between plated courses is the rhythm that lets people talk, finish, be cleared and be ready again. Below fifteen minutes guests feel processed; above thirty five they get restless and the kitchen loses its heat.

The service plan

Write it as a table of times: brigade arrival, setup complete, staff briefing, doors, aperitif, seating, each course, speeches, coffee, carriages, strike. Print it. Give it to the kitchen, the captain and whoever is pouring. It is one page, it takes twenty minutes to write, and it is the single most reliable predictor of whether an evening runs well.

What lateness costs

Fifteen minutes of late seating is absorbed. Thirty costs a course, because the kitchen has either held food or started again. Forty five means the menu changes on the night. Good captains build one flexible course into the plan, usually the vegetable or the cheese, and cut it silently. Tell your guests an arrival time and a seating time, which is normal practice in this trade and removes half the problem.

Aperitif discipline

Three bites and forty five minutes. Guests who stand for ninety minutes with champagne arrive at the table full, tired and ahead of the wine. If you know the group runs late, build the reception to last an hour with four bites and tell the kitchen to plan on a 20:15 seating rather than hoping for 19:45.

The service timeline builds the backwards plan from the hour your first course should leave the kitchen.