Corporate Dinner

A corporate dinner is a working instrument. It has a purpose, a finish time and a guest list where one person’s allergy, one person’s seat and one person’s flight matter more than the sauce. The best of these evenings feel relaxed because everything around them is rigid: a written service plan, a seating plan with dietary markers, one speech slot between courses, coffee at a known time and cars booked for the end.

Menu strategy is confidence, not complexity. Three or four courses, one clear luxury signal, a vegetarian main that is a real dish rather than a side plate, and nothing that requires a lecture. Guests are concentrating on each other. Portions should be moderate, because people who have worked all day and will fly early do not want nine courses, and the service should be invisible enough to leave a conversation uninterrupted.

Dietary handling separates professionals from amateurs here. Requirements collected in writing, marked on the seating plan, communicated to the kitchen as a document and delivered as a dish of equal standing. The worst moment in private dining is a plate of steamed vegetables arriving in front of the one guest the evening was arranged for.