New York

New York has the deepest American talent pool and the hardest buildings. Your evening is decided by the service entrance, the elevator schedule and the building’s certificate of insurance.

New York has the talent, the produce and the appetite. What it does not have is easy access. Private dinners here are logistical exercises run inside buildings with rules: certificates of insurance, service entrances, elevator windows, doormen who will not let a rental truck double park. Every competent New York caterer has a staff member whose job is paperwork, and a host who starts with the building management rather than the menu saves the entire evening.

Prices are the highest on this list alongside Monaco. A four course plated dinner for fourteen in a loft, with chef, sous chef, captain and two servers, lands at 6,000 to 9,000 euros with food and rentals, and a chef with restaurant credentials starts at 900 euros for the day. The offsetting advantage is quality of execution: you can hire a brigade that plates at restaurant standard, a captain who runs a silent service and a sommelier for the evening, all freelance, all on the same night.

The open plan loft changed how dinners are designed here. If the kitchen is in the room, the cooking is the entertainment, so menus have moved towards finishing in front of guests: raw fish dressed at the counter, a whole fish carved on the island, pasta finished in a pan at the table. The practical cost is that dishwashing has to happen somewhere invisible, which is why good New York caterers arrive with bus tubs and a plan rather than using your sink.